Good morning.

Spent the week prepping for my first 10 Reels and learned more than I expected.

Today, we got:

• What 85 outliers taught me about my first 10 Reels

• AI for SMBs, leadership power skills, and LinkedIn for consultants

• The calmest AI walkthrough I've watched in months

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

📊 What 85 Outliers Taught Me About My First Reels

I sat down this week to decide what to shoot for my first 10 Reels.

After avoiding video content for over 6 years, sitting down to pick what to shoot should have been easy.

Hundreds of analyzed videos in my niche sat in front of me, the highest-performing content in the space.

Not one of them felt like me.

Idea generation is overwhelming work. It’s super easy to overthink this part.

And oftentimes, the good ideas are already in your own experience, but they don't come to mind when you need them.

Top 100+ outliers by the top creators in my niche

There's a reason none of those outliers felt like me. It has to do with what "cringe" actually means for me. When creators talk about cringe, they mean tolerating posting bad content before you get good.

My concern about cringe is different. It's about authenticity.

I know my first few dozen videos will suck and feel cringe, but copying what works for everyone else and not finding what’s me is what would really feel cringe.

So the filter I built this week had two parts. Does this work, and is this me?

Letting the data guide me

The first part of that filter needed data.

Monday, I started running outliers through Claude using Sandcastles*, the analysis tool I'm using to ensure my efforts aren't wasted on shit ideas.

After analyzing a dozen videos, I thought I'd spotted a pattern.

And by “I spotted,” I mean Claude spotted. 🤓

Question and list hooks appeared to be underused goldmines in my niche.

I didn’t stop there.

On Tuesday afternoon, I traded the spreadsheet for Instagram. Pure content consumption. After scrolling for an hour (or two), I could feel which formats had a texture that matched my voice.

When I came back, I expanded the analysis by giving Claude another, larger batch of outliers. By the time the sample grew past 80, a different pattern emerged.

I’ll see your lists and questions and raise you a secret reveal 💁🏻‍♂️

The winning formats were heavily used and had strong medians, with 'secret_reveal_breakdown' leading the pack.

The discipline was to keep working and let the data correct what I thought I knew.

Stopping after the first batch would have cost me 12 hours of shooting the wrong videos. Ah. No, thanks.

The third filter

The data answered the first part of the filter. I found what ideas are proven.

Then I sat with the 10 picks Claude produced.

Something was off.

The hooks read like demonstrations.

"I built a Claude agent that scans local market data," and "I broke up with ChatGPT and moved my entire real estate practice to Claude." Except I hadn't done either.

I hadn’t been clear enough about what I wanted Claude to do. I didn't tell Claude to ask me first how I'd authentically build on those 10 outliers. So Claude jumped ahead and created hooks from the data.

This is why you can’t be lazy with AI. It’s happy to fabricate shit to appease you, but that wastes your time.

Quick recap. The dual filter from Monday had two parts:

1. Does this work?

2. Is this me?

The work on Tuesday and Wednesday uncovered a third.

Have I actually done this?

Let’s call it the Authenticity Filter.

It sounds obvious, and this is a great example of where you need to use your thinking, judgment, and taste to push back on AI to ensure it gets it right.

Plus, I could go do those things and then create content around them, but that’s extra work I don’t have time for, and there’s plenty of experience I can already draw on. I needed to be more specific in my instructions and tell Claude when to bring me back into the process.

The work before the camera determines whether the camera matters.

Research was just the first step of the work.

Now, I have to go back and choose an angle, a contrarian take, and write the hook for each of those 10 ideas. Hooks based on real experience.

Then, I’ll write the scripts.

The camera finally turns on after all of that.

For any project that ends in a camera, a launch, or a publish, the leverage is upstream.

If you want to grow your business or build an audience through content, the best way to protect your time investment is to create new versions of proven posts in your niche.

Build on what's proven in your niche by remixing the core components.

Coming up with one idea and running with it won’t yield the results you’re looking for. You need 100 to find the best 20 to prioritize the top 5-10.

The first Reel posts at the end of the month.

My process will begin to click and become faster with repetition.

Where in your creative work have you been jumping to execution before doing the prep?

Hit reply and tell me what your version of "the work before the camera" looks like.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

🧠 Why Leaders Need "Power Skills"
A quieter take on why trust at work keeps eroding. The skill angle landed.

🏪 Anthropic courts a new kind of customer: small business owners
A bundle of Claude features for small business owners just shipped. I'm watching this one.

💵 LinkedIn will enable consultants to book business direct from their profile
LinkedIn Premium just made it easier to turn your network into paid sessions. Big shift.

My Favorite Things 💙
What I’m reading, watching, and enjoying

🎙️ Ex-Amazon AI Leader: In 1 Year, the Gap Between AI Users and Everyone Else Will Be Irreversible by Silicon Valley Girl

Watched this on Tuesday. Don't let the title spook you.

The conversation itself is the calmest, most practical AI walkthrough I've heard in a while. Allie K. Miller talks through how she runs her stack, builds a skill live on camera, and names the 3 context docs every solo operator should start with, all without the usual scare tactics.

Good morning.

Spent the week clearing out clutter. Organizing my desk, closing a gazillion browser tabs, and doing some long-overdue cable management. The kind of reset that should've happened a while ago.

Spring cleaning applies to both physical and digital spaces. 🌱

Today, let’s talk about:

• A confession I've been carrying

• What $12,000 of dormant gear cost me

• A book I highly recommend you read ASAP

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

😔 Why I've Been Avoiding My Studio For 6 Years

I have a confession.

I've been putting off something I've genuinely wanted to do for 6 years.

It doesn't make any sense.

Why put off something I'm that excited about?

Well, what started as a simple obsession turned into something I overcomplicated.

How it started

In 2015, I stumbled on Gary Vaynerchuk's #AskGaryVee Show on YouTube. I was immediately hooked on the laid-back, conversational format.

Shortly after, I discovered my favorite YouTuber, Peter McKinnon. I loved his vibe, the look and feel of his videos, and I became obsessed with the idea of creating videos around my interests in a casual, authentic format like Gary's, but with the look of Peter's vids.

Fast forward to 2018: I stepped into a Director of Technology role I'd helped create at my real estate brokerage.

I started filming content on my iPhone, and after about a year, I bought my first camera (a Sony A7iii). I learned to edit in Adobe Premiere Pro, and as I went deeper into the craft, I fell down the rabbit hole of production gear.

Wanting better audio and a tighter shot turned into this 😅

Going into 2020, I had built a full content production studio in my office and was ready to go all-in on creating content for me and the agents and leaders in my brokerage.

Before I could get started, I was hired for a Regional Tech Trainer role to support 5,000 agents and 100 brokerage leaders across 6 states. Then, the pandemic hit.

Since then, my roughly $12-15K worth of gear and the skills I had built have been dormant, collecting dust. 😩

When I launched this newsletter in May of 2023, the goal was to finally launch a YouTube channel and leverage the time invested in writing scripts (~10 hours per week) by turning them into weekly newsletters as well.

That never happened either. 🫠

I fell down another rabbit hole, learning everything about the email newsletter business. I've written 125 newsletters since, not once turning them into YouTube scripts or shooting, editing, and publishing videos.

Six years later

My physical and digital spaces are cluttered and mentally draining.

On top of that, the idea of relearning my editing workflow and acquiring all the new skills I'll need to achieve the quality of videos I want feels daunting.

I love editing, by the way, but I'm dreading that first edit, which will likely take 8-10 hours for a one-minute Reel. “Ain’t nobody got time for that!”

Looking back, in trying to make content that looked and felt like Peter's, I created complexity that felt exhausting before I'd shot a single frame.

Peter McKinnon

The gear was supposed to make me ready. Instead, I was prepared in theory and paralyzed in practice.

I couldn't get out of my own way. Ideation came to a halt. I feared doing the thing I was obsessed with. The thing I loved began to feel like a job I didn't want.

I had everything I needed, but I couldn't get past the overwhelm I created.

The studio I built to start became the reason I didn't.

And yet.

Today, I've never been hungrier to start filming, get back in the editing chair, and finally get some long-form and short-form videos out.

I started this with a confession. I'll close with a commitment.

This week, I started by clearing my desk, closing unnecessary tabs and windows, and began setting up my production studio. The only thing left to do is the work itself.

The pull to create is finally bigger than the fear of starting.

Command Center

The gear is out. The cameras are ready. The first Reel ships this month.

What's the thing you're genuinely excited about, but keep finding reasons not to start?

Hit reply and share with me.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

🧠 Empathetic Leadership Can Make or Break AI Adoption
Why AI rollouts succeed or fail has almost nothing to do with the tech.

🎨 Instagram updates algorithm to benefit original creators
The algorithm just shifted in favor of creators who actually make their own stuff.

🔥 'This is fine' creator says AI startup stole his art
The creator of one of the internet's most iconic memes is calling out AI theft.

My Favorite Things 💙
What I’m reading, watching, and enjoying

📘 Co-Intelligence: Living and Working with AI by Ethan Mollick

Listened to this on Libby last week and it was incredible.

A 4.5-hour read that's the best foundation I've found for anyone wanting to understand AI, how it works, and how it's shaping our world. Even with how much has changed since it came out in 2023, everything in it still holds up.

Good morning.

I finally set up Claude Cowork this week, the desktop version of Claude that can read your files and run real tasks.

The setup itself was the easy part. The bigger lesson came from how I prepped for it, and what happened when I asked Cowork to audit my workweek for the first time.

Today, let’s talk about:

• The hack hiding in plain sight that most setup guides skip

• The 5-step setup that turns Cowork from chatbot to coworker

• What happened when Cowork audited my own workweek

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

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🤝 How I Set Up Claude As My AI Coworker

I had Claude help me set up Claude Cowork.

The setup guides don't tell you to do that.

The desktop version of Claude can read your files, run real tasks, and act like an actual coworker instead of just a chatbot.

Before I did anything, I asked Claude to write a detailed setup guide for me. 1 hour and 20 minutes later, I had a working AI coworker built around my business.

The hack hiding in plain sight

Setup guides for Cowork are everywhere on Twitter and LinkedIn, but they're all general. None of them are specific to your business or industry.

My wife says it best. "The best hack in the world is to ask AI how you should ask it how to do something."

I had Claude build a custom setup guide for me. It pulled from everything I'd already documented about my business.

• ICP (ideal customer profile)

• Newsletter system

• Positioning doc

• Full tech stack

• Business goals

• Style rules

By the time I sat down to set up Cowork, I had a personalized walkthrough that knew exactly where I wanted to land.

Your AI coworker is only as good as the context you give it.

What I almost did instead

Claude Connectors

Open Cowork without prep, and you'll do what I almost did. Start clicking. Connect every tool the app suggests. Install extensions before knowing what they do.

I know because that's what I did first. Before I'd written a single foundational file, I'd already connected:

• Visual Studio

• GitHub

• Notion

• Zapier

• vidIQ

• Canva

• Figma

I also installed nearly every available Anthropic extension.

Connecting tools is fine on its own. The trouble starts when you hook AI up to your business before you've told it anything about it.

I'm pretty sure I told you not to do that in the newsletter two weeks ago, yet here I went. 🫠

Let me show you how I should have done it from the start.

HERE'S HOW:

• Build a folder structure

• Write four ABOUT ME files

• Set global instructions

• Drop reference files into a library

• Run one real task

Each step earns the next. Skip one, and the rest get weaker.

Build a folder structure

Cowork needs to know where to look and where to leave things alone.

I created a parent folder called CLAUDE COWORK with 4 subfolders, each with a distinct role.

ABOUT ME holds the files Cowork reads before every task. LIBRARY holds bigger reference docs Cowork only reads when I summon them.

OUTPUTS is where finished work lands, and TEMPLATES is reusable scaffolding.

The architecture matters. Lean files for auto-read, deep references for on-demand.

Write four ABOUT ME files

My initial prompt to begin setup

These are the files Cowork reads before every task, so every line has to pull its weight.

4 files in total:

• Who I am and how I work

• My voice and style rules

• My current goals and focus

• Who I serve and what I solve for them

I had Cowork draft them using the source material I'd already prepared.

Total size stays under 6,000 tokens combined. Lean is the goal.

Set global instructions

Added Global Instructions to Cowork

Global Instructions are the rules Cowork follows on every task, no matter what you ask.

Mine looks like this:

• Read every file in ABOUT ME before any task

• Never touch LIBRARY or OUTPUTS unless I say so

• Ask before assuming

• Never fabricate

The folders are the rules. The instructions enforce them.

Drop reference files into a library

LIBRARY is for the docs Cowork should know exist but shouldn't read every time.

If Cowork needs it on every task, it goes in ABOUT ME. If it needs it occasionally, it goes in LIBRARY.

My full tech stack inventory lives there, along with a prompt creator prompt doc.

Cowork knows these files exist. It suggests when to load them. I confirm before it does.

Run one real task

My tech stack audit

The setup only counts when Cowork actually does something for you.

Pick a task you know well enough to spot when the output is off.

I asked Cowork to read my tech stack and identify where my workweek leaks time. Mid-task, it caught a conflict between 2 of my files about how I use Notion.

Instead of guessing, it asked me to clarify. The whole task took 25 minutes.

That was the moment I knew the setup was solid.

What the audit found

Cowork found 4 places where my workweek leaks time. All 4 I knew about. 1 it made impossible to ignore.

I still don't have a clear idea capture system in place. That was the one that stood out.

But Cowork also got one wrong. One of its findings was based on a calendar block that exists in my plans, not in my actual week.

I gave it aspirational context, so it gave me aspirational answers.

AI is only as smart as what you feed it.

In under 2 hours of setup and one test task, I built a working AI coworker and the foundation for everything that comes next.

Cowork only worked because the foundation was already there. A positioning doc written in January. Voice rules refined across 124 newsletters. An ICP crafted to sharpen who I was talking to in my content.

If you don't have those yet, your first ABOUT ME file is where they start.

That's the work most people skip. Then they wonder why their AI gives them generic answers.

Want to set this up for yourself?

Reply with "send the prompts," and I'll personally email you three:

• A prompt to define your ICP

• A prompt to build your positioning doc and topic tree

• A prompt to create custom Cowork setup instructions for your business

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

📊 How to Move from AI Experimentation to AI Transformation
Most companies have adopted AI. Few are seeing the bottom-line impact.

📱 Instagram Improves Insights UI, Adds New Metrics
New tabs, share and skip rate data, and views over time. The metrics most creators have been asking for finally surfaced, where you can actually find them.

🔗 What Technology Convergence Looks Like in Practice
Paradigm shifts come from combining technologies, and AI is the connective tissue.

My Favorite Things 💙
What I’m reading, watching, and enjoying

📖 Unshakeable by Tony Robbins

I read this last week. The insights from some of the world's greatest investors are genuinely useful, and the approach to investing your hard-earned money is simple and thoughtful.

That said, the book felt more like a sales pitch for a few lead magnets, which was a bit of a turn-off.

If you're new to investing or unsure what to do with money that's sitting in savings being eroded by inflation, this is a good book to read (or listen to). At minimum, it'll give you a solid baseline.

Good morning.

How the AI Twitter bros say they're using AI, and how the rest of us use it, are two very different things.

Today, I'm walking you through the five-stage framework I use to decide where AI fits in my business and creative process.

Let’s talk about:

• My AI Fit Framework

• How slowing down speeds up AI

• Why I still haven't fully automated anything

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

🐢 How To Know Where AI Fits

I've saved sixteen hours a week with AI.

The biggest gains came from the weeks I used it the least.

More and more business owners want to bring AI into their work.

They've seen the hype, pulled up ChatGPT, and they're ready to go.

OK, but now what? They don't know where to start.

Here’s the thing. When you start in the wrong place, AI makes your work worse.

You might want to automate tasks that require your judgment, while AI sits idle on work it could've handled for you in seconds.

The result is sloppy outputs, broken workflows, and a nagging suspicion that the hype is an empty promise.

The fastest way to use AI is to slow down.

Entrepreneurs move fast. They don’t overthink, they just go.

So for AI, they pick a tool, point it at a task, and hope for the best.

Unfortunately, that approach produces the worst version of AI, because AI only works as well as the thinking you give it.

A better prompt won't fix it. A better process will.

HERE'S HOW:

1. Survey Where AI Could Help

2. Run The Workflow Manually First

3. Bring In AI For The Heavy Lifting

4. Keep Your Thinking In Your Hands

5. Only Automate Once You've Earned It

I call this the AI Fit Framework.

The order matters, so walk every workflow through these five stages, step by step.

Step 1: Survey Where AI Could Help

Before you do anything, ask one question. How could AI help here?

You're not committing to anything. You're taking inventory.

Start with a blank page and list every recurring task you handle. Then scan the last two weeks of your calendar for the tasks that repeat and the hours you've spent on them. Mark the ones that drain the most time.

Look for the heavy lifting, the repetitive formatting, and the research that would take you hours. That's where the leverage lives.

If you can fully document a process, AI can do it.

This stage is reconnaissance.

Scout the terrain now so you know what to watch for later.

Step 2: Run The Workflow Manually First

Do the work yourself. All of it.

This is the step everyone wants to skip.

It feels slow, and you'll tell yourself AI could do it faster.

Running the workflow manually is how you find the bottlenecks that waste your time. It's how you see the gaps in your own process, the ones you can't spot from the outside. And it's how you learn what good output actually looks like, so you have a standard to hold AI accountable to later.

Skip this step, and you're teaching AI to do something you've never seen in motion.

That’s when the wheels come off.

Step 3: Bring In AI For The Heavy Lifting

My custom-built prompts and files for Onward Everyday

Once you've run the workflow enough times to know it cold, bring AI in for the tasks that take you the longest and yield the lowest return on your time.

What AI handles well once you've done the reps:

• Deep research and competitive analysis

• Copyediting for voice, active voice, and reading level

• Reformatting your raw ideas into polished deliverables

• Repurposing one idea across multiple formats for social

My newsletter production is the proof. Twenty hours a week dropped to four or six once I built a system in which AI handles the heaviest parts while I direct the work.

That number fell again later. I'll come back to how.

Step 4: Keep Your Thinking In Your Hands

Flash, Flash, hundred yard dash

Here's where I made my biggest mistake.

Early on, I rushed. I gave AI a quality prompt, but let it figure out the rest.

The output was far worse than anything I would've written myself.

When I slowed down and gave AI my full thinking—a paragraph, a brain dump, and the context in my head—the output sharpened, and my workflow sped up.

My newsletter production had already dropped from 20 hours a week to 4-6.

When I stopped rushing and started leading with my thinking, it dropped again to 3-4 hours. I cut another hour or two off my week by doing more of the thinking.

Slowing down sped me up.

The same is true of any human assistant. Without clear input and context, the output won't be worth using.

AI is an assistant. It only performs as well as the input you give it.

Lead with your thinking. Let AI pressure-test it.

Step 5: Only Automate Once You've Earned It

Re-engagement automation in beehiiv

The final stage is full automation, and it has to be earned.

For something to run without you, you have to understand it completely.

You have to have run it manually enough times to document the steps, the decisions, and the edge cases.

Otherwise, you're automating something broken. A broken process at scale is just a bigger mess. That's where you lose trust.

I've been using AI in my newsletter workflow for over a year. The only things I've fully automated are my beehiiv subscriber flows and list cleanup, work that runs the same way every time and doesn't need my judgment.

Everything else stays AI-assisted, because I haven't earned the right to remove myself from more of the process yet.

Plus, it has to be me, me, me. That Same Ol’ G.

AI can do almost anything now.

That's exactly why it matters where you put it.

Survey the terrain before you build. Run the workflow yourself until you know it cold. Bring AI in for the heavy lifting. Lead with your own thinking. Automate only what you've earned the right to.

The tortoise wins this race, too.

Slow is how you go fast.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

👔 When the CEO Becomes the Brand
What happens when the founder's politics and the company's brand become impossible to separate.

📲 Instagram Expands Your Algorithm Tool to Explore
More algorithm control across Explore and Reels. The twist is whether anyone will actually use it.

🔓 Anthropic's Mythos Model Accessed by Unauthorized Users
A small group gained access to Anthropic's most locked-down AI model the same day it was announced.

My Favorite Things 💙
What I’m reading, watching, and enjoying

📖 The Infinite Game by Simon Sinek

I finally got around to this one last week (audiobook format), and it's one of the best books I've read in a long time. Sinek's breakdown of how capitalism has shifted over the last fifty years and what that's done to modern businesses is incredibly timely.

It reinforced something I already believed: more companies should stay private and focus on their just cause, instead of burning themselves out playing a finite game they can't actually win.

Good morning.

I've been excited about AI's new connectors but reluctant to give them the keys to my external accounts, like Gmail, Drive, Calendar, and Notion. I went deep on privacy policies to figure out what's actually going on behind the scenes.

Today, let’s talk about:

• The toggle that determines if your data is kept for 30 days or 5 years

• What happens when you connect your external accounts to AI products

• The three things I'm doing before I connect anything

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

Protect online privacy from the very first click

Your digital footprint starts before you can even walk.

In today’s data economy, “free” inboxes from Google and Microsoft, like Gmail and Outlook, are funded by data collection. Emails can be analyzed to personalize ads, train algorithms, and build long-term behavioral profiles to sell to third-party data brokers.

From family updates, school registrations, medical reports, to financial service emails, social media accounts, job applications, a digital identity can take shape long before someone understands what privacy means.

Privacy shouldn’t begin when you’re old enough to manage your settings. It should be the default from the start.

Proton Mail takes a different approach: no ads, no tracking, no data profiling — just private communication by default. Because the next generation deserves technology that protects them, not profiles them.

Get free private email

👀 What Nobody Tells You About AI Privacy

For the past month, I've been dying to go deeper with AI.

The new connectors, the agent tools, the potential.

All of it is exciting.

But every time I got close to linking an account, I stopped. It wasn't clear what the downsides might be.

Every tech creator on YouTube is showing you what these tools can do.

Nobody is talking about what's actually happening behind the scenes when you do.

Or about the risks.

I invested the time in reading privacy policies, help docs, and security reports so you don't have to.

The click everyone's racing toward

Watch any YouTube video about AI right now, and you'll see the same thing.

Connect Gmail. Connect Drive. Connect your calendar.

Then watch the magic happen.

The creators are showing you what AI can do with your data.

Nobody is showing you what happens to your data once AI and the company behind it have it.

I use Claude, so that's where I dug in. The privacy questions are the same no matter which tool you use.

What I found in the fine print

When you give an AI tool access to an account, your information passes through the company's servers.

It's stored alongside your chat and retained based on your settings.

Think of AI like a contractor with a key to your house. They come in when you call them, they see what they need to see, and they leave.

But whether they keep notes and share them with the rest of the company depends entirely on your settings.

One thing that surprised me.

Claude only accesses your account information when you specifically ask it to. It's not passively reading your entire inbox in the background.

You ask a question, it pulls what it needs, and that's it.

If I ask Claude to summarize today's meetings, it pulls my calendar events for today. Not my entire calendar history.

Cool, but retention is the most important piece.

Retention decides how long AI companies keep your conversations and what they do with them.

In Claude, there's a toggle called "Help Improve Claude."

Toggle these OFF

With it on, your conversations can persist for up to 5 years and be used to train future versions of the AI. With it off, retention drops to 30 days and is not used for training.

One toggle. Massive difference.

There's an important distinction here. Anthropic doesn't use raw account information, such as your emails or calendar events, to train the AI. They've been specifically excluded for privacy reasons.

But anything you type about that information is treated differently.

Say Claude reads your client's email. That email is protected.

But when you type "draft a reply to Sarah's concerns about pricing," what you typed could be used to teach the AI, depending on your settings.

And once the AI learns from it, that can't be undone. That's what makes the training toggle worth checking first.

I've had mine off since day one.

I wanted to understand what I was opting into before I opted in.

There's also a location metadata setting that shares where you are when you use Claude. I turned that off, too.

It's a small thing, but it's information I don't need to share.

The parachute problem

“And we have three good main chutes out the window.”

Entrepreneurs jump first and build the parachute on the way down.

It's the instinct that makes us good at starting things.

The problem is that when it comes to data and privacy, that approach is dangerous.

For example, by default, Anthropic employees can't read your conversations.

I would expect that.

However, there are two exceptions.

When you submit feedback via the thumbs-up or thumbs-down buttons, the conversation is shared with Anthropic employees. And if Anthropic's automated safety systems ever flag something, a Trust & Safety reviewer could see it.

That includes whatever email or calendar content was pulled into the conversation.

It’s important to know that bad actors can hide instructions inside documents or emails that trick AI into doing things you didn't ask for. This is called a prompt injection. Yikes.

And as we’ve hopefully learned by now, no company's security is perfect. Even Anthropic accidentally made some of its own internal data publicly accessible a couple of weeks ago.

These aren't reasons to avoid AI. There are reasons to use it with your eyes open.

The privacy toggle you ignore in your AI platform decides what happens to your data for the next five years.

What changed for me

Here's the part I didn't expect.

The research didn't make me more cautious. It made me more confident.

Once I understood the risks, I was comfortable moving forward with intention.

You don't need to become a privacy expert. You just need to do three things before you link anything.

• Check your privacy settings (the training toggle and location metadata that I covered above)

• Before linking any account, ask yourself one question: Do I have a real use case for this, or am I just clicking a button because I can?

• If you can't name a specific workflow, don't link it yet

That last one changed my approach. I'm linking my Calendar, Drive, and Notion to Claude because I have specific workflows for each.

I'm not connecting Gmail because I don't have a strong enough reason yet. I'd love to have Claude triage my inbox every morning, but that's a want, not a need.

And I'm skipping the Chrome extension because it burns through tokens too quickly and is painfully slow. Using web search in Claude is faster and more effective.

Not everything needs to be connected and used. Just the things that earn it.

I'm glad I paused over the past month.

The answers didn't scare me off.

They gave me the clarity to move forward with confidence.

This week, I'm finally linking those accounts. Eyes open, settings checked, and use cases clear.

Have you checked your AI privacy settings yet?

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

🤖 How Gen AI Robots Are Reshaping Services
Waymo has completed over 20 million trips. What happens when AI goes beyond chatbots and starts physically showing up in the real world? If you think AI agents on your laptop are a big shift, wait until you see what's coming next.

📸 Instagram Chief Debunks Popular Engagement Hack
Adam Mosseri finally addressed whether reposting your posts to Stories actually boosts reach. If you've been doing this religiously, you'll want to hear what he said. He also dropped a hint about a feature creators have been begging for.

📖 A Simple Guide to Common AI Terms
A plain-language glossary of AI terms from AGI to hallucinations. If you've ever felt lost when someone throws around "LLM" or "chain of thought," bookmark this one. It's the cheat sheet I wish I'd had two years ago.

My Favorite Things 💙
What I’m reading, watching, and enjoying

🎬 Learn 80% of Claude Cowork in Under 20 Minutes by Jeff Su

Jeff is one of my favorite AI creators, and this video is a great example of why I appreciate his work. He breaks down the seven core capabilities of Claude Cowork with real examples and walks you through the setup from scratch. If you've heard of Cowork but aren't sure why you need it, this is the video to check out. It's the reason I'm confident enough to start using it myself this week.

Good morning.

I’m flying home today from a much-needed spring break with family in Cancún. 🏖️

Recharged and ready to get back to work. 👨🏻‍💻

In the meantime, let’s talk about:

• The 90-day stretch that changed AI

• Why I ignored most of it (on purpose)

• What this means for your business right now

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

🤖 How AI Became More Hands-On

AI didn't just get smarter over the last 90 days. It got hands.

Well, kind of.

The past two months, I've been writing about Instagram strategy. Carousels, ManyChat automations, and Reels.

Meanwhile, every day, my Twitter feed was going bananas.

OpenClaw, Cowork, Perplexity Computer, Dispatch, Computer Use, Meta acquiring Manus, Nvidia building NemoClaw.

One release after another, nearly every day for weeks.

And with every one of them, someone was losing their f-ing mind over it. 🤯

The weight of all of them landing at once is what got me.

That feeling of watching the ground shift while you're busy building sucks.

And all the noise makes it impossible to know what actually matters.

The pattern underneath the noise

The shift happened in a pattern.

OpenClaw went viral because it didn't answer questions. It opened apps, booked flights, and managed calendars.

Anthropic shipped Cowork and Computer Use.

Perplexity launched Computer, a tool that builds and executes entire workflows across 19 different AI models.

Meta bought Manus for $2 billion and started turning WhatsApp Business into an "Action App."

Every major company made the same bet within 90 days.

When the chip company that powers all of AI (Nvidia) announces its own agent platform, you know the era of "ask a question, get an answer" is wrapping up.

That tells you everything.

AI stopped being a search engine on steroids. It became a coworker.

The entire industry pivoted from building chatbots to building agents.

AI that acts.

It opens your apps, fills your spreadsheets, drafts emails and texts in your accounts for your review before you hit send.

It manages your files and builds systems with code while you're away from your desk.

Perplexity claimed their Computer tool replaced a $225K marketing stack in a single weekend. One tool. One weekend.

VentureBeat called it the beginning of the end of the ChatGPT era. Fortune Business Insights projects the agentic AI market will grow from $9 billion this year to $139 billion by 2034.

What I did with the noise

I ignored most of it. On purpose.

OpenClaw required Terminal installation and had real security concerns. Researchers found data exfiltration vulnerabilities. Users reported agents accidentally deleting entire email inboxes during automated cleanup.

I passed.

Instead, I watched where the dust settled. And it settled on Claude.

Cowork gives you a persistent AI workspace. Dispatch lets you assign tasks from your phone.

Computer Use lets Claude navigate your browser, control your desktop, and complete tasks across your apps. All inside one ecosystem, without needing to touch a command line (the text-only interface developers use to talk to computers).

That's when I made a decision. Once I wrap up my current consulting projects and get back from spring break, I'll go deep.

Anthropic Academy, Cowork, Code, Skills, Dispatch. Learn it all in a safe environment before helping others build with it.

I haven't mastered any of it yet. But I know where I'm going.

What this means for you

You don't need to understand every release from the last 30 days. You need to understand one thing.

AI is quickly becoming a tool that does work alongside you.

If you're running a service business solo or with a small team, the gap between you and the company with 10 employees just got a lot narrower. Here's where to start.

• Explore what's new in Claude. Cowork, Connectors, Memory. Open it up and poke around. Don't try to master it yet. Just see what's there.

• Pick one repetitive task in your business and ask yourself whether you'd want an AI to handle it end-to-end. Complete the work, not just draft a response.

• Pay attention to the pace. Since Anthropic launched Cowork in January, they've added Computer Use, Dispatch, Memory, Excel and PowerPoint integration, and a connectors marketplace. All in about 3 months. The features launching today will feel basic by the end of the year.

Remember, anything you can document, AI can complete for you.

Over the past couple of months, AI has been learning to do more than just answer questions.

Now I'm catching up. Intentionally, not frantically. Learning what these tools can actually do before I translate for you.

That's what I love doing. Filter the noise, find what works, and translate it into something you can use today.

I'll be sharing what I find.

What's the AI development that caught your eye recently?

Hit reply and tell me. I want to know what's on your radar.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

🧠 Tapping into Your Team's Circadian Rhythms
Your best work might be trapped in the wrong time slot. This explains why.

🐝 Beehiiv Expands into Podcasting, Taking Aim at Patreon
My newsletter platform* just added native podcast hosting. And creators keep 100% of revenue.

🤖 Perplexity's New Computer Is Another Bet That Users Need Many AI Models
One of the tools I mentioned above is explained. Worth reading if the agent shift caught your attention.

Good morning.

Today is the 52nd consecutive week of publishing Onward Everyday. 🥳

120 newsletters total across 34 months. Not too bad, buddy.

This issue will be a little meta. Not Meta, but meta.

Thanks for sharing this journey with me. 🤝

Today, let’s talk about:

• What a full year of showing up every week taught me

• The machine behind the streak

• The lesson I didn't expect

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

🎯 What 52 Weeks of Consistency Taught Me

The goal wasn’t 52 weeks straight.

Or perhaps it was.

In April of 2025, I was behind.

I'd started this newsletter in May of 2023 with a single commitment.

Publish 100 issues in two years.

By the time spring of last year rolled around, I was running out of runway to hit 100 without going every single week for the rest of the year.

So I made a simple, practical decision. Not a grand declaration. Just math.

I committed to publishing every Thursday.

What I didn't realize was that the commitment would teach me more about building something that lasts than hitting the number ever would.

The number changed. The method stayed.

When I published my 100th newsletter on November 13th, the goal I'd chased for two and a half years was done.

Then I looked at the calendar and realized I was already deep into something else.

I'd been publishing every single week since April. I was closer to a full year without missing a Thursday than I was to quitting.

So I set a new goal. Not a bigger number, but a different kind of proof.

52 consecutive weeks. One full year.

When you commit to something, the journey won’t be what you expected.

If you keep going, you’ll still get there.

The holiday I didn't take.

For the first couple of years after I started, I'd take a break from Thanksgiving through New Year's Day.

This year, I didn't. I published straight through the holiday season, including the weeks I absolutely did not feel like it.

Not because you needed my newsletter over the holidays.

I’m certain you didn’t.

Because consistency doesn't negotiate with the calendar.

That was the moment the streak became real.

The machine that made it possible.

I didn't publish 52 weeks because I'm more disciplined than you.

I published consistently because I invested time in building a system that made it nearly impossible to fail.

When I started, a single newsletter took me close to 20 hours.

Ideation, research, drafting, revising, and editing. All of it was done manually.

By the time I hit my 100th newsletter, the same process was taking 4 to 6 hours, start to finish.

I built a Claude Project with 7 custom prompts. One for each phase of my production process.

The AI handled the time-intensive parts. Every decision still ran through me.

One of those prompts runs a full editorial review.

It checks for things like:

• Style violations

• Repeated phrases

• Comprehension loss

• Whether the closing circles back to the opening

I wanted to spend my time thinking through the idea and angle, writing the draft, and doing the final edit. Claude could put its senior editor hat on for the copyedit and my custom-built quality assurance process.

The system didn't replace my thinking. It gave my thinking focus.

The system did what motivation couldn't.

The lesson I didn't expect.

🌳 My topic tree

I am not an ideas person.

What I'm good at is building systems that fill gaps in existing structures.

So when I realized running out of ideas was most likely to break my streak, I treated it like any other operational problem.

I built a simple idea-capture system.

Not novel, I know, but a critical system I hadn’t built for myself yet.

I started logging topics in real time.

That meant conversations, questions I kept getting asked, and things I noticed in my work with clients. Then I used AI to organize them into a topic tree. I grouped them by theme, so I always have buckets (branches) to pull from.

The weeks I felt most stuck were almost always the weeks I hadn't been capturing ideas.

Log it now, write it later.

What I'm carrying into week 53 isn't pride in the number. It's what I proved to myself by showing up consistently.

You don't need to be an ideas person. You don't need endless motivation.

You need a clear topic you can talk about for years, a simple template that delivers consistent value, and a system that handles the parts you're not built for.

Build the system. The consistency follows.

Hit reply and tell me the one thing standing between you and showing up every week.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

📖 Don't Let AI Destroy the Skills That Make Your Company Competitive
The hidden cost of AI that nobody's talking about, and it has nothing to do with jobs.

🔄 Instagram Now Lets You Rearrange Carousel Posts After Publishing
One of Instagram's most-requested features is finally here, and it changes how you think about posting carousels.

⚖️ Jury Finds Meta and YouTube Liable for Social Media Addiction
A landmark verdict that could reshape how platforms are built and what accountability for Big Tech finally looks like.

Good morning.

We covered Comment-to-DM with ManyChat a few issues back. This week, we're going deeper into the additional automations that will help convert leads.

We’re talking about:

• Why one ManyChat automation is never enough

• The three flows that cover every high-intent moment in your follower journey

• How to turn warm DM conversations into booked calls on autopilot

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

Your AI tools are only as good as your prompts.

Most people type short, lazy prompts because writing detailed ones takes forever. The result? Generic outputs.

Wispr Flow lets you speak your prompts instead of typing them. Talk through your thinking naturally - include context, constraints, examples - and Flow gives you clean text ready to paste. No filler words. No cleanup.

Works inside ChatGPT, Claude, Cursor, Windsurf, and every other AI tool you use. System-level integration means zero setup.

Millions of users worldwide. Teams at OpenAI, Vercel, and Clay use Flow daily. Now available on Mac, Windows, iPhone, and Android - free and unlimited on Android during launch.

Try Flow free →

⚙️ What 3 ManyChat Automations Actually Convert

ManyChat is built to automate Instagram conversations.

Most solopreneurs use it for one flow and stop.

You set up the Comment-to-DM automation, watched it work, and felt the pull to keep going. Then you hit a wall.

The options inside ManyChat are abundant.

Triggers, flows, sequences, AI steps, and integrations.

When everything is available, it’s hard to prioritize and know what to build.

Every day, when the next automation isn't running, leads are slipping through the cracks. Someone replies to your Story, but the conversation dies on the vine.

A warm follower DMs a question, gets no response, and moves on.

The foundation is in place. The house is still unfinished.

The three automations that actually move the needle aren't the flashiest ones. They're the ones that work 24/7 without you.

After Comment-to-DM, assuming that the one flow you have is enough is the most common mistake. It isn't.

The goal isn't to automate everything. It's to focus on the three highest-leverage moments in your follower journey. That’s speed-to-lead.

One captures high-intent Story replies before the 24-hour window closes.

Another turns your existing content into a permanent lead engine.

The third converts warm DM conversations into booked calls while you sleep.

The right automations address all three.

HERE'S HOW:

• Story Reply Capture

• Keyword Resource Library

• Lead Qualification + Booking Flow

Build them in the order listed.

The first two generate leads. The third one converts them.

Each takes a few minutes to set up.

Story Reply Capture

ManyChat Instagram Story Reply Trigger

A Story reply is the highest-intent signal on Instagram.

Someone paused, typed, and hit send.

Most creators let these conversations die in the inbox.

The reply comes in and gets buried.

By the time there's a free moment to respond, the window has closed, and the momentum is gone.

Instagram limits businesses to a 24-hour messaging window after any user interaction. ManyChat fires an automated DM within that window, acknowledges the reply, and delivers something useful.

The follower feels seen. The lead stays warm.

The key is designing Stories that invite replies from the start.

A strong opinion works. So does a direct question, or a peek at something you're building.

Think of it this way:

• A bold take gets people to respond

• A generic update gets a tap and scroll

The more specific the prompt, the more qualified the reply. And the easier it is to follow up with something that actually moves things forward.

Set it up once, and every Story reply becomes a doorway instead of a dead end.

Keyword Resource Library

Keywords Trigger in Manychat

This is the automation that generates leads from content you've already created.

Choose keywords tied to your best resources.

For me, it would be:

• CHECKLIST

• PLAYBOOK

• TEMPLATE

• SYSTEM

• GUIDE

When someone DMs any of those keywords, they get the resource instantly.

A follow-up message asks them to share their email.

Then point to those keywords in your bio, your Story highlights, and the captions of your strongest posts. Someone finds an old Reel, sees "DM me CHECKLIST," and sends it at 11 PM on a Tuesday.

The flow fires automatically.

No new post required, no manual reply needed.

The library compounds quietly over time.

Every new piece of content is a potential trigger. Every post you've published is a promotion vehicle for a flow you set up today.

The content doesn't have to be new to be useful. It just has to be pointed at a live keyword.

The content you've already created could have generated leads.

You just hadn't given it a destination yet.

Lead Qualification + Booking Flow

Qualify + Book Leads in ManyChat

The first two automations fill the top of the funnel.

This one converts it.

Once someone has engaged through a Story reply or keyword flow, the hardest part is already done.

The booking flow takes over from there.

The sequence starts with three qualifying questions inside the DM:

• The first surfaces context

• The second reveals urgency

• The third shows whether they're a fit before you commit to a call

Once answered, a Calendly link is added directly to the conversation. ManyChat connects directly to Calendly.

No redirect to a landing page, no extra friction, no manual follow-up required.

The prospect answers the questions, clicks the link, and books.

All inside Instagram.

For service business owners, this is the automation that pays for itself.

A booked discovery call from a DM is a prospect who raised their hand, answered your questions, and put time on your calendar on their own.

This is the automation that turns ManyChat from a content tool into a client pipeline.

Story Reply Capture catches high-intent leads before the window closes.

The Keyword Library turns content into leads.

The Booking Flow turns those leads into calls on your calendar.

Together, they don't just save time. They build a system that works whether you posted today or not.

That's the difference between a tool and a system.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

📖 How Senior Leaders Can Build Their Influence
A strong argument isn't always enough to get people moving. This HBR piece is worth a read if you're working to get peers and decision-makers on board.

🎥 Human Speech and Presence Help Drive Reels Engagement
If you've been wondering whether showing up on camera actually matters, this one has your answer.

🔒 Meta Ends End-to-End Encryption on Instagram
Instagram DMs are becoming less private—and if you're building automations on the platform, this is worth understanding. Learn why Meta made the move, and what it could mean for how your data is used going forward.

My Favorite Things 💙
What I’m reading, watching, and enjoying

📺 The Most Terrifying and Hopeful AI Conversation I've Watched

I watched this one over two sittings.

The first half is genuinely frightening.

Daniel Priestley makes a compelling case for why we could be headed toward another Great Depression by 2029, driven by the unsustainable cost of AI infrastructure.

The second half finds some light. And the ending surprised me.

Both sad and heartwarming, it left me thinking differently about the legacy we actually leave behind.

One of the better conversations I've come across in a while.

Good morning.

You've probably noticed a theme lately.

I've been deep in Instagram strategy.

Hooks, Reels, set building, and now Carousels.

It's been intentional.

These are the content components and formats I see entrepreneurs struggle with most, and I wanted to dive a little deeper into each one.

After the next two issues, we're shifting gears. I'm going deep on AI.

A LOT has happened in the past few weeks. 😅

For today, let's talk carousels:

• Why a high save rate might mean your carousel worked against you

• The 5-slide positions that turn passive saves into active leads

• How to close the loop with a trigger word and capture system

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

🎠 How To Create Carousels That Convert

Carousels are the most saved format on Instagram.

But if your last slide says “Follow for more,” you've done all the work and missed the payoff.

Don’t get me wrong. Saves feel good.

They signal that someone found your content useful enough to keep.

The problem is that a saved post doesn't fill your inbox, start a conversation, or move someone toward your offer. You've built a filing system for someone else's convenience.

The save happens because the carousel felt like a complete resource. The content was so well-packaged that saving it felt like the reward.

It's the same reason people bookmark articles they never read and add things to wishlists they never buy.

The save is a false finish line.

The carousel did its job too well.

A high save rate doesn't mean your carousel worked. It means it felt too complete to act on.

The structure that converts delivers real value and leaves one thing deliberately unresolved.

Here's what that looks like across 10 slides:

The carousel gets readers 80% of the way there. The CTA closes the last 20%.

The carousel structure that converts isn't harder to build. It just requires deciding what the gap is before you design Slide 1.

HERE'S HOW:

• Hook With A Pattern Interrupt, Not A Promise

• Build Value One Idea At A Time

• Design Every Slide To Stand Alone

• Close With A Trigger Word, Not A Platitude

• Connect Your CTA To A Capture System

Each of these works on its own, but together they turn a passive post into an active lead generator.

Hook With A Pattern Interrupt, Not A Promise

Instagram gives carousels two chances to earn the swipe.

Slide 1 appears first. If someone scrolls past, Instagram resurfaces the carousel later using Slide 2.

That means your first two slides are both hook slides.

Each one has to earn the tap on its own.

A bold statement, a counterintuitive claim, or a visual that breaks the pattern of everything around it creates a curiosity gap that pulls people in.

Think of it as a billboard, not a table of contents.

Large text, high contrast, and one clear idea.

The goal isn't to explain what's inside.

The goal is to make scrolling past feel like a mistake.

Slide 2 pulls double duty. In the sequence, it names the problem your reader is living with. In the feed, it's your second chance to earn the swipe.

The problem it names needs to stop the scroll on its own.

Something like “Open houses get foot traffic. They rarely get offers.”

That tension is what makes every slide after it feel worth reading.

Build Value One Idea At A Time

Slides 3 through 8 are where most carousels lose people.

Too many ideas crammed into a single slide kills the momentum before the payoff.

Each swipe should lead to one idea that delivers value and naturally flows into the next idea. By the time someone reaches Slide 9, they've invested enough attention to care about what comes next.

Slide 9 is where you create the gap.

Show them enough to make the next step feel necessary, but leave the final piece for the CTA to deliver.

Numbered slides remind readers that something worth finishing is still ahead.

The carousel builds understanding. Slide 10 is where they act on it.

Design Every Slide To Stand Alone

People screenshot individual slides, share them to Stories, and send them to friends without context.

That means each slide must communicate its idea clearly without relying on the slides before or after it.

A headline, a supporting line, and a clean visual hierarchy. That's the entire formula.

Resist the urge to over-explain. If a slide needs three sentences to make its point, it needs to be two slides.

The goal is for each slide to feel worth sharing on its own.

Close With A Trigger Word, Not A Platitude

“Follow for more” is the most common last slide on Instagram.

It's also the least effective.

It asks for a passive behavior from someone who just invested attention in 10 slides of your thinking.

A trigger word CTA closes the loop the carousel deliberately left open.

“Comment GUIDE and I'll send it over” works because it delivers exactly what Slide 9 made them want.

That's not a transaction. That's a conversation.

The trigger word creates intent. Someone who comments “GUIDE” isn't browsing.

They're raising their hand for help.

Connect Your CTA To A Capture System

The trigger word only works if something happens after it.

That's where ManyChat automation comes in.

The comment triggers a DM. The DM captures the lead and delivers the resource.

I wrote about comment-to-DM automation a few weeks ago, if you want that breakdown.

Without that back-end connection, you've created a conversation starter with no place for the conversation to go.

The carousel gets the save. The system gets the lead.

That's the difference between content that files itself away and content that works while you sleep.

The carousels that compound aren't the best-designed ones.

They're the carousels that resist the feeling of being finished.

A broadcast wraps up. A bridge leaves a door open.

Every slide you create should move someone closer to that door.

Slide 10 is where you open it.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

🤖 Who in the C-Suite Should Own AI?
Every company is "doing AI," but almost nobody has figured out who actually owns it. Harvard Business Review digs into the C-suite debate that's quietly stalling implementation at companies of every size.

🔒 Trust in the Age of Agents
AI agents don't just generate content anymore. They make decisions and take action independently. McKinsey's question is one every business owner should be asking: when the system acts, who's accountable?

💼 LinkedIn Is a Leading Source for AI Answers
People are asking AI where to find credible information, and it turns out that LinkedIn keeps coming up as the answer. If you're not building a presence there, this is worth a read.

My Favorite Things 💙
What I’m reading, watching, and enjoying

A book written in 500 BC shouldn't feel this relevant.

And yet, this 2,500-year-old strategy book still hits.

The Art of War by Sun Tzu took me an hour to read.

It's not about war, it's about winning efficiently.

Three principles that stuck with me:

Know your terrain. Sun Tzu obsessed over understanding the battlefield before stepping onto it. For you, that's your market. Who are your best clients? What do they actually lose sleep over? Clear answers to those two questions are worth more than any marketing tactic you'll find this year.

Win before you fight. His best generals didn't win through force—they set up conditions where victory was inevitable before the battle even started. That's your positioning. When the right prospect finds you, they should already feel like you're the obvious choice. If they don't, that's the work.

Protect your energy for battles that matter. Every service you offer that quietly drains you, every client you keep out of obligation—Sun Tzu would cut them without hesitation. Energy spent on the wrong fights is energy stolen from the right ones.

The book is short, but you just read everything you need. ✅

Good morning.

One of the best ways to clear your mind and ground yourself is to tidy and personalize your physical space.

Turns out, it's also one of the best ways to build a brand.

Today, let’s talk about:

• Why your filming setup is a brand asset that never sleeps

• A thought leader declares that AI is killing the category

• What a plastic surgeon figured out about self-image

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

How can AI power your income?

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• Cutting-edge strategies aligned with current market trends, ensuring your ventures stay ahead of the curve

Download your guide today and unlock a future where artificial intelligence powers your success. Your next income stream is waiting.

Get Your Guide

🖼️ How To Build a Set That Becomes Your Brand

Before anyone hears you, they've already judged your background.

Video content is everywhere, and it's starting to look identical.

Same editing styles, same B-roll patterns, same graphics packages.

When everything looks the same, nothing stands out.

A blank white wall tells people nothing about who you are.

A cluttered background is actively distracting.

Filming in a different spot every week means you're resetting brand recognition with every post.

Every video that looks like everyone else's is a missed chance to be remembered.

A recognizable set is a marketing asset that never sleeps.

People try to solve this with better editing. More graphics, more motion, more polish layered on top of a weak visual foundation.

That's backwards. A well-designed set creates instant recognition, signals professionalism before anyone hears a word, and compounds in value every time you post.

You don't need a $10K studio. You need intention.

HERE'S HOW:

• Commit to One Dedicated Filming Spot

• Design Your Background With Purpose

• Build Depth Into Your Shot

• Treat Audio As Non-Negotiable

• Light It With Intention

Start with the first two this week.

Get those right, and the rest becomes easier to layer in.

Commit to One Dedicated Filming Spot

Open Residency Podcast

Consistency is the foundation on which everything else is built.

Choosing one spot and always filming there is what turns a background into a brand element.

Your audience starts to associate that space with you before they hear your voice.

It also eliminates decision fatigue.

The setup is ready when you are, which makes batching content actually possible instead of something you keep planning to do.

Pick your spot before you buy a single piece of gear.

Design Your Background With Purpose

Kallaway

Charcoal, deep gray, or black walls create better contrast and reduce glare than white walls.

Keep it clean, not empty.

A small bookshelf, a plant, and a floor lamp with a dimmable bulb all add warmth without competing for attention.

Then pick one signature element. Something personal that becomes visually associated with you.

A specific plant, a neon sign, a curated bookshelf, a piece of art.

It should be something you're genuinely appreciative of, not a prop.

One or two intentional elements beat a dozen random ones.

Resist the urge to fill every inch of the frame. Negative space gives you room to breathe in the shot.

The goal is a background that feels curated, not decorated.

Build Depth Into Your Shot

Ali Abdaal

The difference between a flat background and an interesting one is layers.

Position yourself a few feet from the wall so there's visual space behind you.

Foreground, midground, background—each layer adds dimension and makes the shot feel more cinematic, even on a phone.

If the room is smaller and distance isn't possible, shooting into a corner helps create the depth you can't get from space alone.

Two walls at an angle naturally create more visual interest than a single flat surface.

Depth doesn't require a large room. It requires positioning.

Treat Audio As Non-Negotiable

Caleb Ralston

Great visuals can't save bad audio, but great audio can rescue average visuals.

A USB microphone like the Shure MV7+ delivers professional-quality sound without a separate audio interface.

Plug it in, position it correctly, and your audio will outperform 90% of what people post.

If you want maximum flexibility, a lavalier mic clips on and travels with you.

Whatever you choose, test it before you commit.

Record a clip, play it back through headphones, and listen critically.

Your audience will forgive an imperfect background before they'll forgive hard-to-hear audio.

Light It With Intention

Becki and Chris

The industry standard is a three-light setup.

You need a key light as your main source, a fill light to soften harsh shadows, and a hair or accent light to create separation between you and the background.

Overhead lighting flattens everything and casts unflattering shadows.

If you're starting with one light, a softbox key light positioned slightly off-center (45-degrees) does more for your image than any other single investment.

Practical lights, like a floor lamp in your set, look great on camera and add warmth to the background, but keep them dim. They're there for aesthetics, not illumination.

Get your audio right first. Then your lighting. Then worry about everything else.

Building a set doesn't have to happen all at once. Pick your spot this week.

Add one intentional element.

The goal isn't a studio. It's a space that shows up consistently and tells people who you are before you say a word.

You build it once. It pays off on every piece of content you create after that.

That's a brand asset that never sleeps.

Hit reply and tell me—do you already have a dedicated filming spot, or are you still figuring out where to set up?

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

📰 Has AI Ended Thought Leadership?
A self-described thought leader with six books and decades of experience just published a piece in HBR declaring the category is dying. His argument is worth your full attention, especially if you're building authority through content right now. This one hits different when you're trying to figure out what your voice is actually worth in an AI-saturated world.

💰 This Is the Future of Money, According to 4 Experts
Four serious minds—including Ray Dalio and the CEO of Circle—weigh in on where money is headed. Digital wallets, stablecoins, and an internet financial system that moves money as easily as a text message. If you're building a business, understanding how money flows is part of the job. This is a clear-eyed look at what's coming.

📊 Instagram, LinkedIn and Threads Engagement Declined in 2025
If your numbers felt flat last year, they were. Buffer analyzed tens of millions of posts and confirmed it. But there's a buried insight in this report that's more actionable than the headline—and it has nothing to do with posting more. Worth a read before you plan your next 30 days of content.

My Favorite Things 💙
What I’m reading, watching, and enjoying

📖 Psycho-Cybernetics by Maxwell Maltz

Maxwell Maltz was a plastic surgeon who kept noticing that changing his patients' faces didn't change how they felt about themselves, so he dug into why.

The idea that stuck with me most was that your self-image functions like a thermostat, and your outer results can never rise above what you've already accepted internally.

Maltz's take on visualization goes deeper than "picture your goals." He shows how vividly imagined experience trains your brain, just as physical repetition does.

Good morning.

Video is no longer optional for storytelling and building trust online. Yet most business owners can’t get past the idea of being on camera.

Well, I have good news.

One of the fastest-growing formats on Instagram is videos that don’t require your face. Just your voice.

Today, let’s talk about:

• How to create Reels without being on camera

• Two Instagram updates worth knowing about

• A book that will make you rethink how you spend your time

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

Turn AI into Your Income Engine

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🎬 How To Create Reels Without Being On Camera

The algorithm doesn't care if your face is on screen.

It cares about watch time.

And voice-over B-roll consistently earns more of it than talking-head videos.

Short-form video is the top format for organic reach on Instagram.

But most solopreneurs skip it entirely.

They assume Reels means being on camera.

Every week that you (and I) sit on the sidelines, potential clients scroll past you without knowing you exist.

"I'll start when I'm more comfortable on camera" has become the most expensive sentence in content marketing.

Comfort comes from doing.

You’ll never become comfortable if you never start.

A simple system can get you posting next week.

B-roll + voice-over is your reach engine. Use it to get found.

Then use talking-head videos to build trust.

In 2025, voice-over B-roll was one of the fastest-growing formats on Instagram.

In 2026, the dust data has settled. It consistently drives higher reach and wider distribution to non-followers than talking-head content does.

Talking-head videos build deeper trust and engagement with people who already follow you.

But you need reach before trust matters.

Voice-over B-roll solves the first problem. Being found.

Better yet, this format is built for batching.

HERE'S HOW:

1. Write the Script

2. Record the Voice-Over

3. Source Your B-Roll

4. Edit It Together

5. Batch It Like a Pro

Each step is more straightforward than you think.

Step 1: Write the Script

A script written in Sandcastles.ai

Voice-over B-roll lives or dies by the script.

Without a face on screen, the words carry all the weight.

You have to evoke emotion and curiosity.

Follow a 4-part structure:

1. Hook (2 seconds)

2. Setup (3-5 seconds)

3. Value (15-40 seconds)

4. CTA (3-5 seconds)

Total target: 30-45 seconds of audio. No more than 60 seconds.

Write shorter sentences than you think you need.

You are scripting, not riffing.

Make. Every. Word. Count.

Every extra word costs you viewers.

Start with a bold claim.

Or a pattern interrupt (something unexpected that stops the scroll).

Never start with context-setting.

Write context into the setup, not the hook.

Write it out, read it aloud, then cut 20%.

What remains is your script.

Step 2: Record the Voice-Over

The single biggest upgrade you can make to your Reels is to ensure your audio is clear and confident.

Voice-over gives you full control.

Record in a quiet room with your phone or a clip-on mic.

The Voice Memos app on iPhone works fine.

Do 3-5 takes and use the best one.

Your first take will feel wrong. Record it anyway.

Your best take will likely be the second or third.

But, hey, you might find that you’re a one-take wonder. Good job, Larry. 🍊

Natural pauses, casual tone, and conversational delivery outperform overly scripted or AI-generated voices.

Real human voices drive the emotional impact that earns saves and follows.

Once you have a clean take, your Reel has a spine.

Everything else layers on top.

Step 3: Source Your B-Roll

Filming B-roll is simple and fun.

Three sources work well together:

1. Footage you film yourself (see Step 5)

2. Screen recordings for process or tool demos

3. Free stock libraries like Pexels or Storyblocks

The selection rule is simple. Match what you show with what you say.

When you mention something specific, your B-roll must show viewers what you're referring to.

Random stock footage that has nothing to do with your words is the fastest way to lose viewers mid-video.

There are a few caveats, but finding key visuals that match your story is critical to preventing viewers from leaving due to comprehension loss.

Plan on 15-20 short clips for a 30-45 second Reel.

You need a new visual roughly every 2-3 seconds to maintain retention.

Step 4: Edit It Together

Editing Reels. Get it? 😂

Instagram's standalone Edits app handles everything you need for your editing workflow.

Plus, word on the street is you’ll get a boost in reach posting from Edits. This is common when platforms want to promote new features. It won’t last forever.

Record your voice-over first, then layer visuals on top.

Import your audio track first.

It becomes the timing guide for everything else.

Lay B-roll clips on top, cutting every 2-3 seconds to match the pace of your voice.

Static shots lasting more than 4 seconds become drop-off points, leading viewers to scroll away. Keep ‘er movin’.

Add auto-generated captions and clean them up for accuracy.

Then drop background music in at 10-15% volume so it adds texture without competing with your narration.

Step 5: Batch It Like a Pro

The Bad Batch

The real advantage of voice-over B-roll isn’t any single Reel.

It is how efficiently the format batches.

Write five scripts in one session (2.5 hours).

Record all five voice-overs back-to-back (60 minutes).

Invest a day to film a general B-roll session for reusable assets.

Prioritize clips you can reuse across multiple Reels:

• Environment shots (your office, a café, outside)

• Daily habits (making coffee, walking into a room)

• Workspace shots (typing, writing, opening a laptop)

• Close-ups (hands, products, screens, written notes)

• Movement clips (walking toward or away from the camera)

Aim for 10 seconds per clip, shoot at 60 FPS (frames per second) for smooth slow-motion in editing, and vary your angles: low, high, and eye-level on the same subject.

Then edit them one by one, same workflow each time (2-4 hours each).

One session per step means less switching, more momentum, and a workflow a pro editor can step into whenever you're ready.

Voice-over B-roll gets you found.

Talking heads build trust that converts.

The best content strategy in 2026 uses both.

But you have to be visible before trust is even possible.

Every week you wait, someone else is getting found instead.

Pick one topic you know well.

Turn it into a 60-second script this week.

Hit reply and tell me what you chose.

I’ll help you frame the hook.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

📖 How AI Damages Work Relationships—and Where It Can Actually Help
We talk a lot about what AI can do for our productivity. This HBR piece flips that conversation and asks what we might be losing in the process. Worth a slow read before you automate the next thing.

📅 Instagram Opens Up Content Scheduling to All Users
Instagram just unlocked one of its most useful creator tools for every public account—no Professional Mode required. If batch-scheduling your content has been on your to-do list, the barrier just got a lot lower.

🖼️ Instagram Introduces Thumbnail Post Editing for Grids
Your profile grid is often the first impression someone gets before they decide to follow you. Instagram now lets you control exactly how each post thumbnail appears there. Small change, big impact on first impressions.

My Favorite Things 💙
What I’m reading, watching, and enjoying

📚 Deep Work by Cal Newport

Two rules really stood out for me.

Rule #3, Quit Social Media, argues that reaching for your phone every time there's a quiet moment trains your brain to lose its ability to focus, and that reclaiming boredom is actually how you protect your capacity for deep work.

Rule #4, Drain the Shallows, was the gut check. Most of what fills our days isn't real work. It's the performance of work. If your days are endless meetings and constant distractions, you'll never get any actual work done. Newport's answer is to get intentional about what deserves your time and ruthlessly protect it.

If you've ever ended a full day wondering what you actually got done, this book is worth your time.

Good morning.

For most business owners, social media feels like a necessary evil.

A grind that rarely produces the return it promises. So you post when you remember, hope something lands, and wonder why nothing compounds.

It doesn't have to work that way.

The difference between content that builds a business and content that just fills a feed usually comes down to one thing: what happens after someone engages.

Today, let’s talk about:

• The tag trigger that keeps your subscriber list from coming through empty

• Nearly 70% of your audience interactions are never captured. Here's the fix

• Why collecting emails inside a DM converts at 70–80% when landing pages average 10–20%

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

Wake up to better business news

Some business news reads like a lullaby.

Morning Brew is the opposite.

A free daily newsletter that breaks down what’s happening in business and culture — clearly, quickly, and with enough personality to keep things interesting.

Each morning brings a sharp, easy-to-read rundown of what matters, why it matters, and what it means to you. Plus, there’s daily brain games everyone’s playing.

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💬 How To Turn Comments Into Conversations

Every time you say "link in bio," you're asking your warmest leads to do the hard work of finding their way into your world.

Most of them won't bother.

And it's not because they aren't interested.

It's because you're creating friction at the exact moment they're most ready to take a step towards you and your business.

Someone watches your Reel, nods along, feels the pull.

Then you send them off the platform they're already comfortable with to find a page they've never seen.

The algorithm immediately serves them the next video.

The moment passes.

You never connect.

ManyChat analyzed billions of Instagram conversations and found that nearly 70% of audience interactions are never captured.

Two out of three people who engage with genuine interest never become leads.

That's not a content problem. That's a handoff problem.

Getting someone to follow you is easy. Getting them into your world is where most solopreneurs fumble the handoff.

Using ManyChat automation fixes the handoff.

When someone comments with a specific keyword on your post, ManyChat automagically sends them a direct message.

The automation delivers your promised resource, starts a conversation, and begins the relationship without them ever leaving Instagram.

And as a byproduct, every comment your post receives sends an engagement signal that tells Instagram the content is worth showing to more people.

Think of it less like a marketing funnel and more like new client onboarding.

Except you're onboarding them into your world before they ever become a client.

HERE'S HOW:

• Set Your Trigger Word

• Write a First DM That Feels Human

• Build the Email Capture Step

• Connect It to Your Newsletter

• Write the Post That Feeds the Automation

Each step takes a few minutes to set up. Here's how to do it right the first time.

Set Your Trigger Word

One keyword is all you need. Simpler is always better.

A trigger like GUIDE, SYSTEM, or PLAYBOOK is easy to remember and easy to type, which means higher comment rates.

Avoid phrases or multiple words.

If you're running a single trigger word tied to a single lead magnet, set it to fire on "any post or reel" inside ManyChat.

If you're running multiple campaigns with different offers, set it to a specific post instead so the right DM always matches the right content. 👈

This is your always-on welcome mat.

The goal here is a frictionless on-ramp, not a puzzle.

Write a First DM That Feels Human

It’s definitely not my personal robot

The first message makes or breaks the entire flow.

Generic copy kills trust before the relationship starts.

Create a greeting that sounds like you’re talking to a friend or colleague, then deliver exactly what you promised in the post caption.

One clear next step only.

No multiple links, no pitch, no "by the way" offers tucked in at the end.

A simple message like this works well:

"Hey! Thanks for commenting. 🤩 To send you the [guide], what's the best email to reach you?"

Write 3–5 variations of that message and rotate them using ManyChat's built-in Randomizer.

Instagram's spam filters flag accounts that send identical responses at scale. This applies even through Meta-approved tools like ManyChat.

Variation keeps your automation feeling human and your account in good standing.

Short. Direct. Delivered. That's how trust starts.

Build the Email Capture Step

Optional: ask for email address

After the first DM, a second message moves the relationship forward.

The ask is simple. "What email should I send this to?"

ManyChat prompts them to type it directly in the DM thread.

No form. No new tab. No friction.

The conversation never leaves Instagram.

And because they're giving you their email before receiving the resource, they're choosing to start a relationship—not just grab a link and disappear.

ManyChat collects the email directly inside the DM thread.

This is where a comment becomes a subscriber.

And the reason it works better than a landing page comes down to trust sequencing.

They've already received something valuable. They're already in a conversation with you.

The ask feels like a natural next step, not a transaction.

Online business educator Stephanie Kase—who has helped 5,000+ students grow with Instagram and email marketing—documented her results after switching from landing pages to this method.

Her email opt-in completion rate went from 10–20% to 70–80%.

The process is the same. The friction is gone.

Connect It to Your Newsletter

Zapier makes you happier

ManyChat integrates directly with most email platforms.

With beehiiv*, a Zapier connection sends the captured email directly to your subscriber list the moment someone opts in.

One setup note. Configure the Zap to trigger when a user is tagged in ManyChat, not when they become a new contact.

At the new contact stage, ManyChat doesn't have their email yet, and the Zap will come through empty.

Tag the contact inside ManyChat, so you know exactly which automation they came from. This makes it easy to track what content is driving your best subscribers.

That's the full loop. Instagram content → comment → DM conversation → email captured → newsletter subscriber → potential client.

Each step happens on their terms, at their pace, without you having to manually follow up on a single one.

You can also jump into the conversation whenever you’d like.

There's one more entry point worth noting. ManyChat launched Follow to DM in October 2025, a free, Meta-approved feature that automatically sends a welcome DM the instant someone follows your account.

To learn more abt ManyChat, follow Gannon

It's currently in beta, works on all plans, and only fires for followers who haven't previously messaged you.

Think of it as two entry points.

Engaged followers come in through Comment-to-DM. Everyone else gets caught by Follow-to-DM the moment they raise their hand.

That's the system.

Build it once, and every post you write from here plugs into it.

Write the Post That Feeds the Automation

The post and the automation are part of a single system, not two separate things.

If your content doesn't prompt a comment, the automation never fires.

Your caption needs one clear CTA at the end, after you've delivered value.

Something like "Comment [TRIGGER WORD] below and I'll send it straight to your DMs."

Put it last, not first.

A post that teaches something and then offers to go deeper is what drives comments worth capturing.

The resource you're offering matters too.

It should be specific enough to feel like a natural next step from the post itself.

If your Reel covers three signs your content strategy isn't working, your lead magnet should go deeper into fixing it.

The comment becomes the bridge between what they just learned and what they want to know next.

That's the onboarding mindset.

Every post is an introduction.

Every DM is welcome to your world.

Every email captured is the beginning of a real relationship.

The goal isn’t to get more comments.

It’s to turn people who are already paying attention into people who know you, trust you, and eventually work with you.

Every follow, every comment, every DM is a moment where a relationship starts or an opportunity is missed.

This automation makes sure it starts.

Hit reply and tell me. Do you have a lead magnet ready to plug into this system, or is that the next thing you need to build?

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

📖 6 Ways to Make Strategy Resonate with Skeptical Leaders
HBR is talking about boardrooms, but I kept thinking about client conversations. Getting buy-in from someone who hasn't decided to trust you yet is one of the hardest parts of the job—and the tactics here are more practical than you'd expect from a strategy piece.

🧵 Threads Now Offers Simplified Sharing to Instagram
Meta just made it easier to push Threads content to your Instagram Stories without leaving the app. Sounds like a win for content creators, but there's a trade-off worth knowing about before you start using it.

🔐 Discord, Persona, and the Age Verification Problem
Discord is rolling out mandatory age verification—face scans, government IDs, the works. Then, researchers found the verification vendor's code sitting exposed on the open internet. This one has layers, and the backstory on who's funding the company makes it more interesting.

Good morning.

I've been studying hook mechanics for the past three years.

What I learned from writing 114 weekly newsletters, posting on Twitter for over 200 consecutive days, and being mentored by creators with million-plus followers, billions of views, and multiple seven-figure annual revenue?

The same hook that crushes in one format dies in another.

Today, let’s talk about:

• How hook mechanics change across four different formats

• Why the One-Chip Rule works for long-form content

• Which format to fix first (and how to prioritize)

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

🪝 How to Write Hooks That Work

Hook advice is everywhere.

"Create curiosity." "Promise value." "Open a loop."

The advice is correct. The problem is that it's incomplete.

No one talks about how hook mechanics change across formats.

Entrepreneurs create across formats and platforms.

Long-form written content, short-form video, and long-form video.

Newsletters, LinkedIn posts, Instagram Reels, YouTube videos.

They treat hooks as universal, copying and pasting the same opening across formats.

Then they wonder why something that performed well on LinkedIn failed in their newsletter, or why their Reel hook didn't land and increase watch time.

Hooks aren't universal. They're format-specific translations.

Most people try to write one perfect hook and use it everywhere.

Or they wing it, writing whatever feels right for that platform.

Both approaches ignore the constraint each format places on your hook.

The solution isn't writing better hooks. It's engineering format-specific hooks.

HERE'S HOW: 4 Format-Specific Hook Mechanics

• Newsletter Hooks: Start the One-Chip Rule

• LinkedIn Hooks: Stop the Scroll

• Reel Hooks: Land the 4-Part Structure

• YouTube Hooks: Confirm the Click

Each format changes how you engineer attention. Here are the specific mechanics that make hooks work in each one.

Newsletter Hooks: Start the One-Chip Rule

Your newsletter hook doesn't determine if someone opens.

That's the subject line's job.

It determines if they actually read your newsletter.

This applies to any long-form written content. Newsletters, blog posts, Medium articles, or long LinkedIn or Twitter posts.

The job is simple. Make them eat one chip.

The first sentence should be compelling enough to make them read the second.

Then the next sentence. And the next.

One sentence at a time until they've read the whole piece.

That's the psychology.

Starting is the hardest part. Inertia kills more reading sessions than bad content.

Once someone's in motion, though, they keep going.

You're not asking them to commit to 800 words.

You're asking them to read one sentence.

A digital writing mentor of mine, Dickie Bush, calls this the One-Chip Rule.

The One-Chip Rule eliminates the need to decide whether to keep reading.

Just like the Pringles slogan, "Once You Pop, You Can't Stop."

So what triggers that first pop?

A hook that's punchy (direct) and specific. Never clever, and not vague.

A hook like, "I lost 3 clients last week because I ignored this one signal," beats "Things have been tough lately" every time.

LinkedIn Hooks: Stop the Scroll

LinkedIn hooks have one job. Stop mid-scroll.

This applies to any scrollable text post.

Twitter, Threads, LinkedIn, or Instagram carousels.

You're fighting momentum.

Someone swiping fast, deciding in half a second whether to stop and engage.

Punchy works. Contrarian works. Bold statements work.

Context, setup, and throat-clearing don't work.

Here's what most entrepreneurs get wrong about written content.

They think clever wordplay creates engagement.

It doesn't.

Clever makes people pause to decode. Being direct makes them stop and nod.

The constraint is speed. The solution is to be direct.

Directness beats clever because cognitive load kills engagement when scrolling.

"Most people think X. Here's why they're wrong" beats "I've been thinking about X and wanted to share some thoughts."

Studying creators like Justin Welsh over the past three years, the pattern emerges.

The hooks that perform stop you before you realize you stopped.

Reel Hooks: Land the 4-Part Structure

Reels are more complex than newsletter or LinkedIn hooks because you're engineering across four dimensions.

This applies to any short-form vertical video. Reels, TikTok, or YouTube Shorts.

What you say, what you write, what you show, and what they hear.

Kallaway breaks this down into spoken, text, visual, and audio hooks.

The goal stays the same. Pattern interrupt, relevance signal, value promise.

But now you're delivering it across four components simultaneously.

Here's what most people miss.

Visual and text hooks matter more than the spoken hook.

Visual processing happens 60,000 times faster than auditory processing.

Your eyes decide before your ears do.

People read and absorb information visually faster than they can hear it.

Their attention first shifts from visual to text, then to what you're saying, and then back to the visual based on what they heard.

The visual hook decides if they stop scrolling. The first frame needs movement, contrast, or something that breaks the pattern. Before you say a word.

The text hook reinforces the visual.

Most eyes sit center or just above center on the screen.

That's where the overlay text lives. And it needs to map directly to what the visual is showing.

The spoken hook directs attention to the visual.

You're not just talking. You're guiding their eyes to what matters on screen.

When all four components align to the exact same thing, the hook compounds.

The visual shows it. The text names it. The spoken hook emphasizes it. The audio supports the tone.

This alignment prevents comprehension loss.

The moment that confusion begins to set in, viewers will leave your content.

Clarity and curiousity keeps them locked in.

Instagram post

“This is what designing a home will look like in the future” works as a spoken hook.

But pair it with text overlay that says the same thing, a visual that shows a new system for walking floor plans, and you've engineered a scroll stop across all four dimensions that goes nuclear with 14.5 million views.

High-performing hooks don't just say something interesting.

They show it, write it, say it, and soundtrack it.

All pointing to the same moment.

Alignment creates clarity.

YouTube Hooks: Confirm the Click

YouTube hooks do everything Reel hooks do, plus one more job.

Confirm the title and thumbnail immediately.

Someone clicked because your thumbnail promised something. Your first sentence needs to deliver that confirmation fast.

If your title says "The One Email Mistake Costing You Clients" and your hook starts with "I’m Gordon Simle with Onward Everyday, and today we’re talking about..." they're gone.

Skip the intro and get to the point.

Your hook needs to confirm the promise AND establish what's at stake.

"Most entrepreneurs make one email mistake that kills their conversions. Here's how to fix it in under 5 minutes."

Now they know they're watching the right video.

Ali Abdaal and Kallaway do this consistently. Their hooks confirm the thumbnail promise within the first three seconds.

No buildup. No context.

Just an immediate confirmation that you clicked the right video.

If you only have time to fix one format, start with your most-used platform.

Posting daily on LinkedIn? Fix those hooks first.

Newsletter-first? Master the One-Chip Rule.

Building on Reels? Nail the 4-part structure.

Leverage comes from consistency on one platform, not perfection across all four.

The hook isn't the problem. The format is.

Write one hook for all platforms, and you'll fail everywhere.

Translate for each format, and you'll win everywhere.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

🧠 When Every Company Can Use the Same AI Models, Context Becomes a Competitive Advantage
Everyone's using the same AI models. So why are some companies crushing it while others plateau? Turns out what creates separation when the tools are commoditized isn't what you think.

📱 Reddit Reveals the Latest Trends Driving Brand Engagement
Reddit users have a built-in BS detector. How are brands actually winning there? Four trends are working right now. If you create for niche audiences, worth your time.

🔐 Cyber Threats to Watch in 2026 – And Other Cybersecurity News
The latest Global Cybersecurity Outlook just dropped. The numbers around AI-related vulnerabilities caught my attention. Worth a skim if you're running a digital business.

My Favorite Things 💙
What I’m reading, watching, and enjoying

📚 The Four: The Hidden DNA of Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google
By Scott Galloway

I'm only a third of the way through, but this book is rewiring how I think about consumer behavior.

Galloway breaks down how Amazon built a retail empire by tapping into instincts we've carried for 90% of human history. We were hunter-gatherers. The gatherers (mostly women) were responsible for 80-90% of the effort and yield. The hunters (mostly men) provided extra protein.

That division still shows up in how we shop today. Women feel fabrics, try on shoes with dresses, and ask to see items in different colors. Men see something that can sate their appetite, buy it, and get back to the cave as fast as possible. No time for nuance. Just speed. Get in and get out, quick.

For both, the collecting instinct runs deep. Over-collecting was survival. The pile never seemed high enough.

That's why men end up with more watches than wrists, more sneakers than feet, more camera gear than shoots.

Understanding these ancient instincts changes how you see what you buy, why you buy it, and how you market to others.

It's fascinating to see how behaviors that kept us alive 10,000 years ago now determine whether we click "Add to Cart."

Good morning.

There is so much hype around AI every week that it's hard to know what's meaningful and what's noise.

Last week, two tools and a new model dropped, and the tech feeds went ballistic.

AI tools are everywhere now. The trick is knowing when to jump in versus when to wait. Some launches are ready for production. Others are science experiments dressed up as products.

Today, let’s talk about:

• The three AI tools that went viral (and my three different decisions)

• The 5 Adoption Gates framework I use to evaluate any new tool

• Why "not yet" is sometimes the smartest move—even with trusted companies

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

🚦 How To Evaluate AI Tools Before You Adopt Them

Last week, one viral AI tool moved the industry forward.

Another made me pause despite coming from a trusted company.

The third exposed thousands of users' credentials within days.

I evaluated all three the same week they launched.

Two different outcomes from the same company. One complete disaster.

The difference wasn't luck.

It was knowing what questions to ask before clicking install.

Your feed is full of people claiming every new AI tool "changed everything."

The information is everywhere. Knowing when to adopt and when to wait—that's what's not accessible.

Three tools, three different calls

Opus 4.6 from Anthropic. Cowork from Anthropic. Clawdbot (now OpenClaw).

All three went viral the same week. Each one promised to transform how you work.

I adopted Opus 4.6 for my consulting workflow immediately.

I watched Cowork demos with genuine interest. File management automation is exactly what I need.

But I ultimately passed.

And I never even installed Clawdbot.

When trusted companies ship experimental tools

Cowork by Anthropic

Cowork came from Anthropic—the same company behind Opus 4.6. But Cowork has deep access to your computer and files, and the data sharing policies weren't clear enough for me to say yes.

Not because Anthropic is untrustworthy. But because even trusted companies release tools at different maturity levels.

Opus 4.6 included enterprise security documentation, case studies, and clear data-handling policies. Everything was documented.

The main difference, though, is that Opus is a new, more powerful model of Claude, Anthropic’s version of ChatGPT. It doesn’t have deep access to my computer’s terminal.

Cowork was positioned as exploratory. Intriguing, but not yet production-ready for my risk tolerance. Maybe yours is different.

Company reputation alone isn't enough.

What being reckless looks like

Then there's Clawdbot. I mean, Open Claw [Read, but don’t use].

When installed through your computer’s terminal, it has access to everything—calendar, email, and messages.

And it is wide open to anyone who knows where to look.

Security researchers found hundreds of exposed instances. The digital keys to user accounts were sitting in an unlocked drawer.

Anyone could walk in and grab them.

The creator even admitted it wasn't ready for non-technical users.

That's not a tool. That's a liability disguised as innovation.

And it made Wednesday's news cycle for exactly the wrong reasons.

The questions that separate bets from experiments

The difference between getting burned and getting ahead isn't speed—it's knowing how to evaluate before you adopt.

Before adopting any AI tool, I ask five questions.

Not technical questions. Business questions.

I call it the 5 Adoption Gates.

Five questions that take five minutes but can save weeks of cleanup.

The 5 Adoption Gates:

1. What proof exists that it's ready for my use case?

2. Who built it, and what's their track record?

3. What happens if it's compromised?

4. What data does this touch?

5. What's my exit cost?

Opus 4.6 cleared all five gates easily. The documentation is thorough.

It’s just a new model for a proven generative AI tool.

The security standards are enterprise-grade, and the company has a track record of careful releases.

Cowork cleared three gates but stumbled on data access and exit costs.

I couldn't get clear answers on what data would be shared with Anthropic or how I'd extract myself if needed.

Clawdbot failed gate one. It wanted access to everything, without the security infrastructure to protect it.

The hidden cost nobody calculates

Every new tool has obvious costs. Subscription fees. Setup time.

The hidden costs show up when things break or when you realize you need to get out.

One developer set up a simple morning reminder and went to bed. Clawdbot checked every 30 minutes to see if it was time to execute—but sent its entire memory with each check instead of just asking "is it morning yet?"

Each check cost $0.75. He woke up to find $20 gone overnight. Running basic reminders this way would burn $750 a month in API credits.

When Clawdbot's security flaws went public, users couldn't just uninstall.

They had to manually audit every connected system. Calendar, email, Slack, banking apps, CRM—each one requiring credential rotation and security review.

Think about the cleanup cost. If you've connected 10 systems, and each requires 2-3 hours to properly audit and secure, you're looking at 20-30 hours of work.

And that's assuming nothing was compromised.

With Cowork, I'm watching for clear data policies, proven case studies, and whether the file management benefits outweigh the access I'd need to grant.

That patience isn't a fear of innovation. It's protecting my business and personal data while others beta test in production.

The 5 Adoption Gates aren't about avoiding all risk. They're about taking calculated risks instead of reckless ones.

I adopted Opus 4.6 fast because it passed all five. Speed still matters—when you're betting on the right things.

The next time something goes viral, run it through the 5 Adoption Gates before you adopt.

The hype will still be there next month. A compromised computer won't be.

Tuesday morning, I read the documentation.

Wednesday, I read the security reports.

That clarity helped me say yes to one tool, not yet to another, and hard no to the third.

That's not analysis paralysis. That's strategic implementation.

What AI tool are you evaluating right now?

Hit reply and tell me—I'll walk through the 5 Adoption Gates with you.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

🔬 AI Doesn't Reduce Work—It Intensifies It
HBR with the contrarian take we needed to hear. Everyone's selling AI as the solution to your workload problem, but this research suggests it might be creating a different kind of pressure entirely. Worth the read if you've been wondering why your AI tools haven't freed up as much time as you expected.

🌍 The Real Economics of AI and Jobs
The World Economic Forum's Saadia Zahidi breaks down what's actually happening in the job market as AI scales up. The predictions range from catastrophic displacement to productivity renaissance—but she argues the biggest factor determining which future we get isn't what you think.

📊 2026 Social Media Benchmarks
Fresh benchmark data from Socialinsider analyzing 70 million posts across platforms. TikTok engagement jumped 49% year-over-year while Instagram stayed flat—but the real story is in the comments and shares data. If you're trying to set realistic goals for your content, this is your starting point.

My (Not So) Favorite Things 💙
What I’m reading, watching, and enjoying

📖 Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini

I finished this book last week. Interesting book—lots of case studies and examples illustrating the six core principles: reciprocity, commitment and consistency, social proof, authority, liking, and scarcity.

But here's the honest take: not worth the 10 hours of reading time. I could've gotten these same ideas in a 20-minute Alex Hormozi video. He hammers on these concepts constantly—especially reciprocity, social proof, and scarcity.

My goal was to use the takeaways to improve my copywriting and marketing plans.

If that's your goal, too, save yourself 9 hours and 40 minutes. Watch Hormozi break down how he uses these principles in practice. You'll get more value, faster.

Good morning.

It has felt nearly impossible to write for the past few weeks.

I hope that I’ve been able to continue delivering value for you each week.

As a close friend shared the other day, “I feel like everything is upside down.”

Thanks for sticking with me. The name of this newsletter has never felt more real.

Today, let’s talk about:

• Why AI made content creation easy for everyone—and why that makes distribution the real bottleneck

• The 3-question diagnostic to identify your distribution gap (and the hub-and-spoke framework to fix it)

• How to start building your distribution system this week with one platform and three pieces of content

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

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📢 How Distribution Became the Bottleneck

Every business can now create professional-quality content using the same AI tools.

Claude writes captions, Canva designs graphics, and Descript edits video clips.

The bottleneck isn't creation anymore.

It's getting your content in front of people ready to hire you.

And most business owners are solving the wrong problem.

Full transparency: I'm writing this newsletter because I need to figure it out myself.

I've published 110+ newsletters.

I've built systems that cut my creation time from 20 hours to 4.

I can write a well-crafted newsletter and publish it in beehiiv, where it reaches email subscribers and becomes a blog post simultaneously.

But if it isn't seen and read by the people looking for help with these topics, it doesn't matter how good it is—my business won’t grow.

That's the distribution question. And it's the next bottleneck I need to solve.

What distribution actually means

Distribution isn't some abstract marketing concept.

It's the specific actions you take to make sure your content gets seen by people who might hire you.

Here's my current workflow. I write in beehiiv and hit publish.

That sends the newsletter to my email list and automatically creates a blog post on my beehiiv website.

Two channels, one action.

Then comes distribution. In theory, I should:

• Write social CTAs (pre-newsletter teaser, post-newsletter promotion)

• Pull 3-5 ideas and create 2 Instagram carousels from the newsletter

• Post "newsletter live" to LinkedIn with a hook and link

• Extract 10 content ideas using AI to seed next week's social posts

• Respond to replies and comments in the first hour (finish within 24 hours)

• Repurpose into a YouTube-native script for the following week's video

• Track what performed best and create variations of winning content

But I don't do most of these consistently. That's the gap I'm working to close.

You need to have the foundation to make distribution work.

Ask yourself three questions:

• Do I spend as much time distributing as creating?

• Do I have owned distribution (email list of 1,000+)?

• Do I have content that lives beyond the feed (e.g., newsletter, YouTube)?

If you answered no to any, that's your distribution bottleneck.

The problem most people face, including me, is spending 90% of their time on creation and 10% on distribution.

The shift that changed everything

In the past year, AI made content creation accessible to everyone.

In 2025, content creation became the #1 use case for AI among marketers (55%), with over half using it for newsletters and email.

The barrier isn't AI capability anymore.

It's knowing how to use it for your specific workflow.

Everyone can create content now.

Every consultant, every coach, every real estate agent.

The math is simple. When every service provider in your space can create quality content, you need better distribution to stay visible to potential clients.

You need to reach them where they are.

Platform behavior made it harder at the same time.

Organic reach declined.

Algorithms favor paid content.

Inboxes are crowded.

The "create good content, and clients will find you" window is closing.

The newsletter-first strategy

When everyone can create, distribution becomes the differentiator.

This is why I've leaned into the newsletter-first approach.

Email is owned distribution—you control the relationship.

Social media is a rented space where platforms control reach.

It’s like giving out your business card to everyone and not receiving any in return.

beehiiv's workflow gives me a two-for-one advantage.

I publish once and reach subscribers via email while creating a blog post that lives on the web.

That web-native content gets discovered through search and shared on social.

The newsletter becomes the hub. Social content becomes the spokes that drive reach and bring your target audience back to the hub.

Here's how it works:

1. Write a newsletter, 500-1,000 words, showcasing your expertise (Hub)

2. Film a YouTube video using the newsletter as a script (Spoke)

3. Extract 3-5 insights for Instagram Reels (Spoke)

4. Pull 2-3 insights for LinkedIn Carousels (Spoke)

5. Use CTAs to drive subscriptions to the newsletter

One piece of long-form content.

Multiple entry points.

All roads lead to your owned channel.

What I'm learning in real-time

I have my creation system dialed.

I have owned distribution through email and my blog via beehiiv.

What I haven't been doing is investing enough time in breaking long-form content into short-form, platform-native pieces.

I've had the newsletter.

I haven't been creating enough social content to drive new subscribers.

So I'm shifting strategy:

One newsletter becomes ten social pieces. Same depth for you, more reach for people who need to find this.

The newsletter attracts new subscribers through daily content. You get the full depth weekly. They get entry points that bring them here.

Publishing starts the distribution plan. The work isn't done when you read it—it's just getting started.

I was so focused on making creation sustainable that I never built the distribution layer.

That's changing now.

Start with one channel

Don't try to distribute everywhere. Pick one platform where your ideal clients are.

This week: Take your newsletter and create three pieces of native content for that platform. If you’re camera-shy, break down one section into a Carousel.

I’d recommend Instagram or LinkedIn.

Track which one drives the most email signups.

That's your distribution baseline. Then build from there.

In 2026, anyone can create professional content with AI tools.

The competitive advantage moved from creation to distribution.

From being good to being found.

Your ideal clients are looking for solutions right now.

They'll find someone's content before they decide. Make sure it's yours.

I'm figuring out my distribution strategy in real-time.

Let’s grow together.

What's working for you?

Hit reply and tell me—I'd love to learn from what you're seeing.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

🧭 In an Automated World, Human Hospitality Is a Competitive Advantage
AI can handle transactions, but the Ritz-Carlton founder explains why human connection still wins deals

🤝 The Minneapolis tech community holds strong during 'tense and difficult time'
Local founders and investors share how they're supporting each other through a crisis in our backyard

🤖 How LinkedIn Marketing Is Adapting to AI-Led Discovery
LinkedIn lost 60% of traffic to AI search and had to rethink how discovery works entirely

My Favorite Things 💙
What I’m reading, watching, and enjoying

📺 The mindset that is slowly destroying your life by Ali Abdaal

Ali talks about the "prison of certainty"—the belief that you can't move forward until you're 100% sure it will work.

This hit me hard because I've been stuck in this exact trap with distribution. I've spent months perfecting my newsletter creation system while avoiding the uncertain work of building my distribution strategy.

His point about two-way door decisions (most things can be reversed) versus one-way door decisions (marriage, kids) completely reframed how I'm approaching my next steps.

Worth watching if you've been overthinking your first move.

📖 The 5 Types of Wealth by Sahil Bloom

I'm about halfway through, and what's hitting me hardest is the section on time wealth—specifically prioritizing relationships with the people who matter most over work.

It's a good reminder that all this work on distribution and systems is ultimately about creating more freedom to spend time with the people I care about, not just chasing business metrics.

Good morning.

What has been happening here in Minneapolis over the past few weeks is heartbreaking (and infuriating) on many levels.

People are being killed, unlawfully detained, physically harmed, and intimidated.

Constitutional rights are being ignored.

There are endless ways people and their families are being negatively impacted behind the scenes, too.

Fred Rogers once said, “Look for the helpers.”

Thankfully, in my community, they’re everywhere. 💜

In witnessing all of this unfold, I noticed something in the details that stood out to me—something that triggered additional concerns.

Today, let's talk about:

• Why I deleted TikTok on January 22 (and what happened after)

• The three-step framework I'm using to take control

• The specific actions I'm taking this week

Take care of yourself, your family, your people, and your community.

That’s what actually matters.

— Gordon

🔒 Why I'm Taking Control of My Data

On January 22, I deleted TikTok from my iPhone.

TikTok updated its privacy policy that morning.

The app looked the same, but this time, three paragraphs stopped me cold.

Precise GPS location tracking.

Citizenship and immigration status.

And a catch-all for "other sensitive personal information" that included health diagnoses, financial data, and sexual orientation.

https://www.tiktok.com/legal/page/us/privacy-policy/en

The new US entity controlling TikTok—Oracle, Silver Lake, and Abu Dhabi investors—now has explicit permission to collect data that the Chinese parent company never handled (the previous Privacy Policy remains in effect for non-US users).

I rarely used TikTok and created no content.

But I didn't want to risk the app using my phone to collect data.

I hit delete.

A few days later, more news broke.

U.S. Department of Justice court filings confirmed that, last year, DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency) employees shared personally identifiable information on 1,000 Americans (and potentially all Americans, living or dead) through an unapproved third-party server.

Health diagnoses. Banking details. Social Security numbers.

The agency can't determine what data was shared or whether it still exists.

That's when I understood the shape of the problem.

This wasn't about one app or one leak.

The problem is that we've spent years handing over data without understanding what we're trading for convenience.

• Better user experience

• Personalized ads

• Entertainment

• Productivity

• Connection

Those were the promises.

I already knew this about our data, as most of you did.

What changed this week is that I no longer knew what the intent of having that data was.

I went from everything’s fine, to it’s time to regain control of what I can control.

The Framework: Delete, Protect, Switch

I spent this week consumed by research—DeleteMe, Aura, data brokers, privacy tools.

The overwhelm wasn't about how much data is already out there.

It was figuring out where to start.

So I broke it down into three steps: Delete, Protect, Switch.

1. Delete: Remove what you don't need (apps, accounts)

2. Protect: Update passwords and multi-factor authentication, limit future data collection, and remove existing data from brokers

3. Switch: Transition core infrastructure to safer platforms only when ready (email, cloud storage)

The order matters.

Deletion is free and immediate.

Protection requires some time and a subscription, but delivers ongoing value.

Switching is expensive (time, not money) and requires thorough planning.

Start with what you can control today.

What I'm Doing This Week

I found there are 41 records of my personal information across 52 sites.

So, I subscribed to DeleteMe.

Judges and high-profile people use it because it works.

Manual removal from over 750 data brokers, and quarterly reports showing exactly what was scrubbed.

After a year, I'll transition to Aura for broader identity protection, but right now I want thorough data removal.

I also audited my iPhone privacy settings.

Every app is marked "Ask Not to Track."

Unfortunately, Androids don’t have this feature. 😅

I limited Location Services to essential apps like Maps, and only while using.

Photo library access is disconnected from everything except the very few apps that genuinely need it.

I'm reviewing every old password remaining in Google Passwords (which I haven’t used in over a decade), deleting old accounts I no longer use, and migrating everything that matters to my existing LastPass account.

Updating passwords on critical accounts—Apple, Google, financial institutions—even though they're already unique 32-character strings.

Transitioning important accounts from SMS two-factor authentication to my Authenticator app or Passkeys in LastPass.

While I’m at it, I'm putting a new data backup plan in place, because if I'm taking control of my data, I need to trust where it lives.

None of this makes me invisible or fully secure.

But that TikTok update was the signal I needed.

What changed for me is the intention behind the data collection.

Not for better ads or user experience—for something else.

We don't have a clear picture of what that is yet, but the subtle shift was enough.

I'm not trying to disappear.

I'm just working to understand what I've given away—and to stop giving more without knowing why.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

📱 Will TikTok Change Under US Ownership?
What the new privacy policy actually changed and why users are reporting censorship already

🔐 Apple's new iPhone and iPad security feature limits cell networks from collecting precise location data
Apple just made it harder for carriers to track your exact location

⚠️ DOGE May Have Misused Social Security Data, DOJ Admits
The DOJ finally confirms what the whistleblower alleged about unauthorized data sharing on millions of Americans

Good morning.

Every January, the top creators make predictions.

This year, they all said the same thing. That's not a coincidence. It's a signal.

Today, let’s talk about:

• Creating videos with captions is now table stakes in the age of AI

• The content progression top creators are using to build trust

• Why imperfection is becoming the stamp of authenticity

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

📱 How Content Strategy is Changing in 2026

Every creator prediction for 2026 said the same thing.

And for once, I agreed with all of them.

What caught my attention wasn't any single prediction.

It was how closely they aligned with what I'd been feeling for much of the past year.

People are burnt out on quick-hit, performative content. I am too.

There's been an underlying sense of people craving substance again.

People want depth, meaning, and connection.

I did what I always do when I sense a shift. I spent 10+ hours researching what's working with content right now.

Not from algorithm hack videos or generic tips.

From watching what the top creators in the world are seeing and testing, where platform signals are pointing, and what the data shows.

What I found wasn't one big algorithm change.

It was a series of micro-adjustments that revealed where content strategy is heading in 2026.

The game isn't about reaching more people right now—it's about holding the attention of the right people long enough to matter.

Five shifts show where content is heading.

I'm calling it The 2026 Content Playbook. Fancy, huh? 😆

Let’s dive in.

Visual Differentiation Through Sets, Not Over-Editing

Open Residency

Over-editing with graphics layered on top of your main shot is getting commoditized. Anyone can add basic visual effects and use fast cutting.

The counter move is in-world set building.

Creating a signature backdrop that becomes instantly recognizable as yours.

For $5,000-$10,000, you can build a Hollywood-level set that differentiates your videos without needing to over-produce every single video. Your background does the heavy lifting and sets, pun intended, your videos apart in the feed.

Can't invest $5,000 in a set? Me neither.

Start with a consistent spot in your home or office. Add a bookshelf, a plant, or some wall art. Less is better.

Consistency creates recognition.

Ali Abdaal

A consistent backdrop lets you make slower, more intentional content that's still visually interesting because it varies from what people typically see in their feed.

When you see someone's Reels and immediately recognize their space before they even speak, that's visual brand equity.

Retention Curve Over Viral Potential

The new-ish ranking factor everyone's whispering about is skip rate.

If more than 60% of people scroll past your Reel in the first 3 seconds, your content gets downranked and shown to fewer people.

The algorithm now prioritizes how long people actually watch, not just how many people click.

This means your hook isn't just about curiosity anymore. It's about retention insurance.

Data shows that 85% of viewers watch Reels with sound off.

Text overlays aren't optional anymore. They're critical.

If your first frame doesn't visually communicate value, you've already lost.

You have to optimize for completion rate, not view count. High retention on a longer video beats high views on a shorter one that doesn't hold attention.

Carousels as Your Middle Layer

Top creators are using a clear content progression.

Reels for discovery and reaching non-followers.

Carousels for going deeper on ideas without leaving Instagram.

YouTube and newsletters for building the trust that short-form alone can't create.

Carousels are the bridge. They let you expand on an idea across as many slides as it takes to teach the concept or tell the story. No filler.

Instagram post

Think of carousels as Instagram's version of long-form.

Lighter than a blog post, deeper than a Reel.

Use a Reel to introduce a concept, then create a carousel that breaks it down in detail.

Two pieces of content, both reinforcing ideas and feeding the algorithm. Yet, they each serve different purposes.

Imperfection Signals Humanity

Something fascinating is happening.

As AI-generated content floods social media, audiences are actively looking for signs of humanness (is that a word?) to determine what's real.

Imperfection has become the stamp of authenticity.

This doesn't mean sloppy content.

It means intentional messiness—showing the behind-the-scenes struggle, leaving in the verbal stumble, filming in natural light instead of perfect studio setups.

Instagram post

Creator-style content is crushing polished production because it feels real, not manufactured.

People aren't just tolerating imperfection.

They're seeking it out as proof you're human.

The Modern Content Stack

Kallaway

Instagram Reels are incredible for reaching new people, but they're terrible at building the kind of trust that makes someone want to make a purchase.

Each 60-second video adds only a sliver of trust.

It takes dozens of Reels (90+ minutes) before someone trusts you enough to buy.

The modern content stack solves this.

• Reels for brand exposure

• YouTube for world immersion

• Email for owning the relationship

All three pieces work together.

Short-form feeds long-form, long-form converts to customers.

The mistake most solopreneurs make is betting everything on one format.

Reels alone won't build your business.

But Reels and YouTube feeding a newsletter? That's the engine.

Now that you've seen all five shifts, here's where to start if you're overwhelmed.

If you only have bandwidth for one change right now, start with making sure that every video has text overlays so your audience can watch on mute.

Again, with 85% watching without sound, everything else fails if your first frame doesn't communicate value visually.

Master this before investing in sets or obsessing over retention.

Most solopreneurs are still playing the 2023 game—perfectly curated grids, trending audio, single-image posts, and relying heavily on generic hashtags.

But with 85% of users scrolling on mute and skip rates now dictating your reach, these empty signals fail to drive the watch time and shares the 2026 algorithm demands.

The creators who pivot now have 6-12 months before this becomes table stakes.

By Q3, everyone will know this playbook.

Your advantage is fast implementation, while most are still using old tactics.

People are craving substance again, and the proof is everywhere.

They don't want AI content. They want human creativity, writing, and videos.

They want in-person events where they can connect with like-minded people.

Digital media doesn't feel interesting right now, unless it's human, thoughtful, and the content goes deeper.

Start with one change this week.

Add text overlays that allow viewers to watch on mute.

Next week, plan your first carousel. In two weeks, outline your first YouTube video.

The window is open.

Move before it becomes obvious to everyone else.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

🚫 Why People Create AI Workslop and How to Stop It
Finally, a name for the problem we're all creating but haven't labeled yet

🤖 Beyond the Hype: 8 Drivers for True AI Transformation in the Agentic Age
Eight concrete drivers that separate real AI transformation from theater

📱 Instagram Rolls Out Algorithm Control Option to All English-Speaking Users
The "Your Algorithm" feature just went global and changes how your feed learns

My Favorite Things 💙
What I’m reading, watching, and enjoying

I know I’ve mentioned it a few times, but I’m OBSESSED with watching the Open Residency podcast.

The set is incredible. The lighting is cinematic. The conversations are the quality I’m starving for right now.

This week’s conversation with Samir Chaudry of Colin and Samir (your favorite YouTuber’s favorite YouTubers) about How to Actually Dominate on YouTube in 2026 was exceptional.

Samir’s story of losing his home in the Palisades fire just weeks before the birth of his son was absolutely heartbreaking and deeply insightful.

Good morning.

Today, let’s talk about:

• Why everyone records meetings, but almost no one uses the notes

• A 15-minute workflow for client meetings (prep brief + follow-up email)

• How to turn training notes into immediate action with one smart prompt

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

📝 How to Turn Meeting Notes Into Action

I've sat through a dozen live cohorts over the past two years.

Every single session starts the same way.

AI notetakers flood the participant list.

A half dozen bots join before the trainer even starts talking.

Then come the questions: "Is this being recorded?" "Can we get the slides after?" "Will the transcript be available?"

Everyone wants the notes "just in case." Just in case they miss something. Just in case they need to reference it later.

Just in case the session matters enough to revisit.

If I had a dollar for every time I heard those questions, I'd be a bajillionaire.

If I had another dollar for every time someone actually went back and used those notes, I'd be dead broke.

People are squirreling away raw material like they're playing Catan.

The Archive No One Reads

Recording meetings feels productive.

You hit the button, and AI captures every word.

The transcript sits in your app, ready when you need it.

Except you never need it. Not because the information isn't valuable, but because a 3,000-word transcript takes work to process.

You'd have to read it, extract the key points, figure out what matters, and then do something with it.

By the time you consider all that, it's easier to just move on to the next meeting.

Recording is the first step, not the finish line.

The real value isn't in having the transcript. It's in what you do with it.

What Leverage Actually Looks Like

Here's a simple workflow that takes 15 minutes total and turns raw transcripts into actual advantage.

Before client meetings, open Claude (or ChatGPT) and paste any context you have.

Last conversation notes, project status, open questions, anything relevant.

Then add this prompt:

I have a meeting with [client name] at [time]. Based on the context above, give me a one-page prep brief: who they are, where we stand, and 3-5 specific questions I should ask.

Five minutes to walk in prepared instead of fumbling through memory.

After the meeting, paste the transcript into Claude with this prompt:

Extract the key decisions, action items with owners, and any blockers raised. Then draft a follow-up email that confirms next steps and references one specific detail they mentioned.

Three minutes later, you have a summary to reference and an email ready to send.

Total time invested: 15 minutes for prep and follow-up combined. Doing this manually takes 45 minutes minimum, if it gets done at all.

The compound effect shows up in client conversations. They notice when you remember the detail they mentioned three weeks ago.

They notice when your follow-up email references the exact concern they raised.

This system makes you that person without relying on perfect memory.

The same workflow works for trainings and events you attend.

Record the session, run it through AI to generate a transcript, then organize it into formatted notes.

Drop those notes into Claude with this prompt:

I just attended a training. I've pasted my notes below. Ask me one question at a time about my business to help me identify immediate actions I can take to implement what I learned. Start with the most impactful opportunity.

Instead of notes sitting in a folder collecting digital dust, Claude walks you through implementation, one specific question at a time, until you have a clear action plan.

You already have the raw material.

Every meeting you record is leverage sitting unused.

The gap isn't more tools or taking more training.

The gap is a workflow that turns notes into action.

Try this once this week. Take one upcoming client meeting.

Spend five minutes beforehand to get your prep brief. Spend three minutes afterward to get your summary and follow-up.

See what happens when you stop collecting transcripts and start using them.

Hit reply and tell me how it goes.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

🧭 Your New Role Requires Strategic Thinking…But You're Stuck in the Weeds
Why promoted leaders get trapped in tactical work instead of thinking strategically

🤖 Anthropic's new Cowork tool offers Claude Code without the code
Anthropic just made AI agents accessible for non-coders who want leverage without the learning curve

📊 7 Digital Marketing Trends to Watch for in 2026
Seven content and platform shifts that will change how you show up in 2026

Good morning.

Well. Here we go. It’s 2026. Hold on to your butts.

Today, let’s talk about:

• Why agents post proof instead of value (hint: it's fear, not pride)

• The 3-2-1 content cadence that keeps your funnel balanced

• What a week of TOF/MOF/BOF content actually looks like

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

🤝 How To Build A Content To CRM Handoff

I've lost count of how many times I've opened a real estate agent's Instagram and seen the same grid.

Three new listings. Two "just sold" graphics. A client testimonial.

Then a quiet stretch of nothing.

This isn't a work ethic problem. It's a strategy problem.

Without a bridge from content to conversation, Instagram becomes another place to feel behind.

The Mistake Hiding In Plain Sight

Agents can create content, but they don’t create content with intention.

They expect social proof to generate leads, even though social proof usually does something else. It validates demand that already exists.

A "just sold" post can reassure someone who already wants to work with you. It rarely convinces a stranger to reach out.

That's why the Call-To-Action (CTA) is almost always weak. "DM me if you have questions" is polite, but it puts all the work on the consumer.

So the consumer keeps scrolling.

The Real Problem Nobody Talks About

Agents and other small business owners aren't posting proof because they're proud. They're posting proof because they're scared.

Social proof posts feel safe.

They announce success without making a claim.

They show results without explaining the process.

They fill the feed without risking judgment.

But safety doesn't build trust. Transparency does.

When you post Reels about how you helped a client arrive at a specific listing price, or a Carousel explaining the mistake most sellers make in spring markets, you're saying, "I know things you don't."

That's vulnerable.

That is also what converts.

To post more intentionally, start with the simple 3-2-1 cadence.

The 3-2-1 cadence works because it forces you to show up as a trusted advisor, not just a winner.

Content isn't your lead system. It's your attention system. Your CRM is your lead system. Build the handoff.

That line is the whole newsletter.

Once it clicks, the grid no longer feels confusing. It starts feeling obvious.

Instagram has one job. It earns attention and establishes trust.

Email and your CRM have a different job.

They capture intent, nurture it, and turn it into revenue.

The gap between those jobs is where most businesses leak money.

Your content should be generating consistent leads every month. For most businesses, it generates zero.

Content should entertain and educate in public. Your email and CRM sells in private.

The Funnel Inside The Feed

A simple way to see this is through the traditional top-of-funnel, middle-of-funnel, and bottom-of-funnel. It’s marketing jargon, but the idea is human.

People don't go from stranger to client in one post. They move from "Who is this?" to "I trust how they think" to "I want their help."

Top-of-funnel content earns attention from strangers.

This is where Reels and scroll-stopper Carousels work best. Your goal is reach and profile views.

Post content that teaches one simple idea in under 60 seconds, shows proof like before-and-afters, or shares your professional take on a common mistake.

If it doesn't make a stranger care, it's not top-of-funnel.

Middle-of-funnel content deepens the relationship with followers.

This is where Stories and educational Carousels live. Your goal is replies, DMs, and repeat viewers.

Post content that shows how you think, gives quick wins, reduces confusion, or addresses objections.

If it helps a follower trust your judgment, it's middle-of-funnel content.

Bottom-of-funnel content captures intent from people who are ready.

This is where Comment-to-DM posts convert. You're capturing opt-ins and starting conversations.

Post content tied to one clear offer with one keyword.

"Want pricing strategies for selling in 2026? Comment PRICE, and I'll DM it."

If it doesn't capture contact info or start a DM, it's not bottom-of-funnel.

When an agent only posts listings and sales, they're living in one tiny corner of the funnel. They're posting proof without creating interest.

They're asking for action without building trust.

How The Handoff Works

The shift happens when you stop treating content like a slot machine.

You know the pattern. Post something, check the views, feel disappointed, post again, hoping this one hits.

No, thanks. My fragile ego can’t handle the rollercoaster.

Plus, that's gambling, not strategy. Start treating it like a handoff.

Reach content creates the first touch.

Relationship content warms the second touch.

Then one clear conversion tactic carries the person across the bridge.

For agents, that bridge can be a Comment-to-DM automation with ManyChat. For coaches and other service businesses, it's the same move with different packaging.

The point isn't the tool. The point is the handoff.

The Destination Makes Everything Easier

A handoff needs a destination. Not five destinations. One.

A specific lead magnet that solves a specific problem for a specific person.

For an agent, a guide like "5 Mistakes Home Sellers Must Avoid In 2026" is a good fit because it addresses a real moment. Sellers are nervous as the spring market approaches.

They want clarity.

They want to avoid a costly mistake that feels obvious in hindsight.

That single guide becomes your anchor.

It turns random posting into a repeatable system.

Building A Balanced Content Cadence

Once the destination is clear, you stop making last-second content decisions on Monday morning.

You stop trying to make every post do the same job.

You build a rhythm that keeps the funnel balanced, even when you're busy.

The cadence is simple. It's 3-2-1.

Three posts each week for the top of the funnel.

Two short Reels built for reach and interest.

One saveable Carousel designed to deliver a quick win.

Two touchpoints each week for the middle of the funnel.

Stories (as a series) on two or three days, showing behind-the-scenes moments and mini-lessons.

One educational post that answers an objection or clarifies a confusing part of the process.

One post each week for the bottom of the funnel. One Comment-to-DM post tied to your lead magnet.

One keyword. One automated DM flow. One link.

What This Actually Looks Like

Here's what a week might look like.

Monday: Post a 30-second Reel teaching one common seller mistake. Clear hook in the first two seconds.

One idea only. Strong visual trust.

Tuesday: Share 2-3 Stories showing a behind-the-scenes moment from a recent showing or client call.

Add a mini-lesson or quick insight.

Wednesday: Post a saveable Carousel titled "5 Questions Every Seller Should Ask Before Listing."

This gets saved and shared. It builds trust.

Thursday: Stories answer FAQs like "Should I wait until spring to list?"

Keep it short, direct, and helpful. Show your process, not just your opinion.

Friday: Your Comment-to-DM Reel or Carousel goes live.

"Want my free guide '5 Mistakes Home Sellers Must Avoid In 2026'? Comment GUIDE and I'll send it."

ManyChat sends the message: "Here's your guide! [link] Quick question: Are you considering listing in the next 3-6 months or just exploring options?"

Weekend: Optional. Post a proof story like a testimonial or recent close.

Or share a personal moment that shows who you are outside of work.

That's the 3-2-1 cadence in action.

The consistency meets your audience where they are, whenever they find you.

What Happens After They Opt In

Instagram earns attention. Email earns permission. Your CRM earns trust.

Once someone opts in, the follow-up should not depend on memory. It should be automatic.

A simple follow-up framework works like this. Deliver value immediately.

Share proof within 48 hours. Address their biggest objection by day 5. Offer a clear next step by day 7.

For an agent, that next step might be a pricing analysis, a listing prep consultation, or a 15-minute call to discuss their timeline.

For a coach or solopreneur, swap the pricing analysis for a content audit or strategy review.

Same handoff. Same structure. Same compounding.

That Instagram grid isn't the problem.

The lack of strategy and the silence between posts are.

The handoff turns that silence into a plan, and the plan turns into momentum.

Three posts for reach. Two touchpoints for trust. One post for conversion.

Run it with one destination and one follow-up sequence for 30 days. Then have your CRM transition them to a long-term nurture plan. Let the system compound.

What part of the 3-2-1 cadence is missing in your content strategy right now?

Hit reply and tell me which stage needs the most attention for you: top of funnel, middle of funnel, or bottom of funnel.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

🤝 Don't Underestimate the Value of Professional Friendships
The people you work alongside shape your career more than your resumé ever will

📱 Instagram Chief Outlines the Challenges of AI Content
Why Adam Mosseri thinks AI-generated posts might actually hurt your reach and engagement

🤖 AI Paradoxes in 2026
The contradictions we'll navigate as AI gets smarter, but humans stay essential

Good morning. Happy New Year. 🥳

I hope 2026 is the year you unlock that one thing that brings you the fulfillment you deserve. I’m rooting for you.

Today, let’s talk about:

• Why certainty is the product your customers are actually buying

• The 5 focuses that create different types of certainty

• How to decide which focus unlocks the most value for your business

Let’s get into it.

— Gordon

🧭 Where To Put Your Energy In 2026

There's a shift no one's talking about as we step into the new year.

The problem isn't AI. It's not the economy. It's not your competition.

The problem is that consumers are anxious and uncertain in an unstable world.

Meanwhile, businesses are trying to sell them features and benefits when they simply want certainty.

Over the past few months, I've watched this play out everywhere.

Banks are tightening credit. Massive layoffs. Entrepreneurs stalling on decisions.

Instagram posts about low-buy and no-buy Q1 from people who want to regain control.

When the world feels uncertain, certainty becomes the product.

The World Feels Wobbly, So Buyers Move Carefully

When people feel uncertain, they don't stop buying.

They slow down. They second-guess. They look for proof that feels solid.

You can feel it in conversations. You can feel it in your lead quality.

You can feel it in the way "maybe" shows up more than "yes."

When banks tighten terms on commercial and industrial loans for small businesses, the margin for error shrinks fast as credit conditions change.

At the same time, attention is exhausted. AI made it easier to publish, so the internet filled up overnight.

Now it's even harder to reach people with your message, and harder to earn trust when everything looks polished.

People are seeking in-person events.

They’re looking for imperfections that signal authenticity in a world quickly becoming artificial.

They're tired of performative content and content that sounds like everyone else.

The Trap Isn't Confusion, It's Stalling

Uncertainty does something sneaky to ambitious people.

It convinces them to wait.

It whispers that the "smart" move is to keep options open until the market settles.

That stall can feel productive.

You tweak your offer. You redesign your website. You reorganize your systems.

Waiting for the dust to settle.

You move a lot of pieces around, and nothing actually moves forward.

The business stays in the same place, just with a fresh face.

The operators who win in 2026 will do the opposite.

They'll choose a direction faster than they feel ready for. Then they'll relentlessly focus on that direction long enough for momentum to show up.

In 2026, Certainty Is The Product.

Certainty isn't a vibe. It's a set of signals your business sends, week after week, even when the world's loud.

A buyer doesn't need you to be perfect. A buyer needs to believe you're steady.

That means your business has to feel predictable when the market feels unpredictable.

It also means you can't outsource trust to the algorithm, a trend, or a single platform. You've got to build trust like an operator.

Where I'm Putting My Energy This Year

I keep coming back to five areas.

None of them is trendy.

None of them is exciting.

They all work whether you're solo or running a small team.

For me, one of them matters more than the rest.

Third on this list is cracking distribution.

This is where I'm putting most of my focus.

Not because the others don't matter, but because this is the ONE thing that unlocks everything else for me, personally and professionally.

I've spent 10 years learning everything I could about branding, positioning, and content creation. I've published consistently for 2.5 years.

But I haven't made the leap into what it actually takes to build an audience from a few hundred followers to 10,000+.

My entire thesis—the highest leverage is code and media—comes down to establishing a personal brand and audience that creates opportunities I can't see yet.

There's nothing else to learn. Only a high volume of execution remains.

That's my focus.

Yours may be different.

To decide which focus matters most for you, pause to assess where your business actually is. Then, decide where you want to go next.

I recommend you shore up your fundamentals first.

Even if your cash position is strong, play red light/green light with expenses to build reserves. You’ll want a significant war chest for the opportunities ahead.

Implement a password manager and update your credentials to secure your business.

Then work through the rest strategically based on what unlocks the most value for your situation.

Here are the five, and the type of certainty each one creates:

1. Run a tight ship

Treat cash flow like a product you manage, not an outcome you hope for.

High rates and tighter credit conditions punish sloppy working capital. The businesses that make it through uncertain years aren't the ones with the best marketing.

They're the ones who can weather a slow quarter without panic.

This creates financial certainty.

2. Implement AI and automation in real life

Use AI to remove low-value work across sales, operations, support, and content.

Not just to generate stuff (and slop).

The unbridled excitement around AI is slowing. People want tangible ROI from real workflows now.

Even if you're solo, you can build leverage here.

This creates operational certainty.

3. Crack distribution

This is where I'm putting most of my focus.

Distribution channels you control are becoming imperative—email lists, partnerships, community, and consistent omnichannel publishing.

I'm building systems for short-form video on Instagram, then repurposing that content for omnipresence across other platforms.

One content strategy, multiple discovery surfaces.

This creates lead certainty.

4. Shift how your business gets found

Discovery is fragmenting.

Search, social feeds, and AI assistants are becoming the first touchpoint, often without sending traffic.

Your job is visibility plus trust signals, not just driving people to a website.

I'm writing generative AI and SEO-optimized blog posts on my newsletter website that don't go out as emails, just content designed to be discovered when people ask ChatGPT or Google for answers.

This creates awareness certainty.

5. Build your trust stack through security hygiene and AI governance

As you adopt more tools and AI, your risk surface grows.

With quantum computing on the horizon, protecting your business online and your customers' data isn't optional anymore.

Basic security hygiene and AI governance are table stakes now.

I use LastPass for password management, 2FA (two-factor authentication) through Google Authenticator or Passkeys instead of text codes, and I'm reviewing old accounts to update credentials or delete what I don't use.

I'm also creating an AI governance policy for my business and personal use.

This creates security certainty.

Each of these creates the same outcome. Your business feels safer to buy from.

Not because you promise certainty. Because you demonstrate the care and consistency that creates it.

I keep thinking about those low-buy Q1 posts on Instagram.

I don’t believe they're about saving money. They're about control.

That's what your customers want this year, too. A sense that the decision won't surprise them later.

Choose a Q1 focus. Get your passwords and cash flow in check.

See you next week.

ONWARD TOGETHER.

Everyday Insights 👀
A few things worth reading this week

🗓️ X Publishes 2026 Marketing Calendar
Steal this calendar to plan Q1 content without staring at a blank doc

📊 The HBR Charts that Help Explain 2025
Ten charts that will sharpen how you talk about 2025 in five minutes

👥 Social media follower counts have never mattered less
The new status move for creators: stop chasing followers, start chasing distribution