1,000 True Fans Is All You Need

The post every content creator should read.I recently reread Kevin Kelly’s post 1,000 True Fans. It’s a MUST READ if you’re a content creator, small business owner, or anyone trying to cultivate a fanbase or following (that makes money) of any kind. Kelly originally wrote the post in 2008 but it’s been updated over the years and talked about by the likes of Tim Ferriss and others.The concept is simple.To be a successful creator you don’t need millions. You don’t need millions of dollars or millions of customers, millions of clients or millions of fans. To make a living as a craftsperson, photographer, musician, designer, author, animator, app maker, entrepreneur, or inventor you need only thousands of true fans.Kelly says that a true fan will buy anything you produce. If you’re a band, they’ll travel across the country to see you play. If you’re a writer, they’ll read every new book or blog post you write. These are diehard fans and they’re the ones you should build your business around.1,000 > 1,000,000A thousand customers is a whole lot more feasible to aim for than a million fans. Millions of paying fans is not a realistic goal to shoot for, especially when you are starting out. But a thousand fans is doable.He’s completely right. 1,000 fans IS doable. And because 1,000 true fans is doable, it’s more valuable and sustainable than 1,000,000 fans. I’d rather have 1,000 diehard fans than spend the rest of my life shooting for an unrealistic goal of competing with a major corporation’s fanbase.Do some math and you’ll see just how valuable Kelly’s concept can be. Keep in mind that 1,000 is, as he says, not an absolute number. You could be shooting for 500 fans or 2,000 or 3,000. Either way, these more palatable numbers of…