A moodboard for people who hate self-promotion

Sharing that's caring

Transforming whatever storm is swirling in my head into a moodboard that is useful and inspiring for myself and others feels very "Sublime," so we plan to keep sharing in this format.

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Self-promotion makes me uncomfortable.
Maybe because I (read: most women) am not really great at it?
Or because I never want to sound sales-y.
Or because with software, it's always easier to justify tossing in one more feature than exposing our work to criticism.

As much as I write about Sublime here, I have a weird aversion to anything that self-describes as "marketing."

Buying ads, growth hacking, SEO optimization, working with “influencers” – these things feel so transactional and forced and not human.

But if you shy away from the dark art of promoting your work, how will anyone find it? 

Making this moodboard on marketing and self-promotion helped me understand and reframe how I want to approach this. 

If you are a builder going through your own crucible, I'm locking eyes with you in silent recognition. You are not alone. This stuff is hard. I hope this moodboard inspires you to PUT YOURSELF OUT THERE.

In fact, let’s use the comments section for just that — drop a note promoting the cool thing you’re working on. I want to hear about it and I bet others do too. 

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Make stuff you love and talk about stuff you love. It’s that simple. By Emily.

What a powerful reframing: it's not about you, it's about the ideas and messages you carry.

The key is to divorce the work from yourself. Take the work seriously, but not yourself.

Rob Hardy’s 10 principles for non-coercive marketing.

always be creative

It's ok to slip into advocacy, as long as you do it tastefully - via Kevin Simler.

Sales as a transfer of enthusiasm.

Soulful bets.

This is spot on. Most founders think they are great at building product and bad at marketing. When the reality is the story is not the story, the story is the product.

On playing the long game and earning attention.

Seth Godin on overcoming the cringe.

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In other news…

Sublime but make it visual

I wrote this newsletter and put together this moodboard using Sublime Canvas (name tbd) – an early prototype of a cool spatial thinking thing we’re building. 

If you are a Sublime premium member and are into these sorts of tools (think Miro/Figma) email me at sari@sublime.app and I’ll give you early access.

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The links

• Sublime

• Slack community

• YouTube

• Twitter

• Instagram

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Self-promo time

I wasn’t kidding – dive into the comments and share what you’re working on!