Viral is unsustainable

Having a viral post is THE best and worst thing that can happen to a blogger.

Good thing: Traffic. People flock to your site. You have an immense amount of attention (for about 3 days). You’re finally reaching people other than your mom’s friends.

Bad thing: Imposter syndrome, which leads to Writing Paralysis. “Am I really worthy of this attention?”, “What if I f*ck up my next post?”, “What if people realize that I’m not that good?”… You don’t have enough courage to publish because… you’re finally reaching people other than your mom’s friends…

Many one-hit bloggers have 1 viral post and disappear, mostly because their audience growth outpaces their skill growth. If people flock to your website because of 1 outstanding work, just to find out that your other work is really not at that level, they can leave as easily as the way they come.

I call this unsustainable growth.

Sustainable growth focuses on growing skills first, and audience second.

Sustainable growth is when people flock to your website because of 1 outstanding work, and realize that your previous works are even better than what brought them here. They will not only stay, but they will also tell everyone.

It is easy to grab attention. You can buy it with ads.
But it is incredibly hard to keep it. The only way to keep people’s attention is to consistently deliver better work.

When it comes to creating, consistently good usually beats unexpected brilliance.

Don’t aim for viral. Aim for consistency.