DECEMBER 6, 2022

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Welcome to The Tilt, a twice-weekly newsletter for content entrepreneurs.

Today's click: Join the first-ever live edition of the 10K Creator Podcast on Dec. 13. Sign up here – it’s free.

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Mastodon: A Good Twitter Alternative?

Twitter is in turmoil, and Mastodon is the next social media thing. Maybe.

But if you are a content creator or entrepreneur in the creator economy, should you make the leap to Mastodon? Will it help your business?

Let’s start the conversation.

What is Mastodon? Mastodon is a network of independent, interlinked servers. They host users’ microblog posts that other users can comment on or repost.

Imagine if Internet Relay Chat (popular in the 1990s) and early WordPress had a 21st-century baby with a modern interface and more sophisticated back-end messaging system.

What doesn’t Mastodon do? Mastodon won’t give you explosive discoverability and virality for you or your content. If you’ve become addicted to the dopamine hit of likes and follows, Mastodon doesn’t deliver that. It is old school. It is simple. It is a federated social network platform. If it becomes successful, it is likely to remain so for a long time.

What should be a creator’s first steps on Mastodon? Set up a Mastodon account and get a feel for the platform. If you find your first server isn’t the best fit, you can move your connections (but not your posts) to another server (including your own).

That’s one good thing about Mastodon’s federated open-source model – you can host your own Mastodon server. A couple of service providers offer this option now, and I’m sure we’ll see an avalanche of these offerings in the coming weeks and months.

What are the potential problems of Mastodon? If Mastodon grows in popularity, abuse problems experienced on other platforms are likely to arise – spam, harassment, account bans or thefts, etc. But its open-source model means no one from Mastodon will vet or hold users accountable.

You live at the discretion of your host server administrators. They can do what they will with your account. As many current servers are run by volunteers, things could get interesting.

If you own the server, you are responsible for the activity on it.

Resources

• ​Mastodon Help – good overview of what Mastodon is, how it works, and what to do with it
• ​Beginner’s Guide To Mastodon, the Open Source Twitter Alternative​
• ​How To Search on Mastodon: Everything You Need To Know
• ​Trunk – help to jumpstart connecting with people and topics
• ​Fedi.Directory – curated list of accounts to follow in different areas
• ​Instances.social – help to find an instance to join
• ​Fedifinder – find and connect with your Twitter network on the Mastodon network
• ​Debirdify – find the people you follow on Twitter on Mastodon

– Steven B. Davis

Dig deeper into Mastodon discovery and learn how it serves up content in the full-length breakdown.

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Entrepreneur: Josh Ellwood

Biz: Debt to Dollars

Tilt: How to make money from Fulfillment By Amazon program

Scene: YouTube, Instagram (3K), Linktree​

Snack Bites:

• Josh didn’t set out to be a content entrepreneur. He tested and tried several side hustles so he could quit his day job.
• One of the side hustles, Fulfillment By Amazon, led to some revenue, but it was a year after he added a YouTube channel to teach how to do FBA that he hit his $3.45K monthly goal and quit his 9-to-5 work.
• In the first four months, his YouTube channel had more videos (31) than subscribers.
• Josh’s success led him to raise his one-on-one coaching service rate from $50 in October 2020 to $149 a month in 2022.

Why We Stan: Josh didn’t start out his YouTube with a passion for his topic but a recognition of topics he knew that an audience was interested in. He also pushed through his regular publishing schedule even though his audience wasn’t growing as big as he wanted.

– Ann Gynn

All the Story: Read more about Josh Ellwood’s entrepreneurial path.

Know a content creator who’s going full tilt? DM us. Or email tilt@thetilt.com.

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• ​The Content Inc. Year-End Assignment: Evaluate the specific audience you are trying to help so that you can truly develop a successful content business. (Content Inc. podcast)
• Joe and Robert are still talking about Twitter and if there is special opportunity for those who stay on the platform? (This Old Marketing podcast)
• ​It’s that time of year. December is Write-a-Business-Plan month. (Small Business Trends)
• ​How many of these 5 marketing hacks for entrepreneurs do you do? (Entrepreneur)
• ​Are you engaged in an alumni network? (Small Business Trends)

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Your team for this issue: Joe Pulizzi, Pam Pulizzi, Ann Gynn, Laura Kozak, Marc Maxhimer, and Dave Anthony, with an assist from Stephen B. Davis.

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