Build Somewhere People Can Go

That’s what it means to build somewhere people can go. When intelligence is everywhere, what is becoming scarce is trust.

The goal today isn’t to sound smart, it’s to be chosen by the right people. It works when people feel safe with you, they know what you stand for, and they know you’ll be there next week.

Audience growth today isn’t just about how many people hit “follow.” It’s about being chosen repeatedly because you’ve built somewhere that makes choice easy.

Short-form is the easiest discovery engine most of us have. 

It works, but it also trains all of us, creator and audience, to live in interruption. Joe Pulizzi recently made the point that the real question isn’t “does short-form work?” It’s “where does it lead?” If short-form becomes the destination rather than the doorway, you win attention but lose depth.

Seth Godin also said last week that it’s not slop because AI made it. It’s slop because someone approved it, low effort, low judgement, volume over impact.

Put that together and it points to the same move, if interruption is everywhere, you don’t need to add to the system, you need to build somewhere people can go.

What becomes even more valuable are the people you can address directly, where they know it’s you.

An audience isn’t just about who can see you, it’s who you can reach, on purpose, next week, next month, when you’ve got something worth saying. That’s the difference between being noticed and being chosen.

Now intelligence is commoditised, the advantage moves to closeness and consistency.

This is how I think about an addressable audience:

– Incidental reach (it might happen).

The social spaces we occupy, but the people we want to reach may not see

– Direct channels.

Intentional reach, where you can actually speak to people (Thursday newsletter, WhatsApp groups)

– Spaces

Compounding trust, where people experience you, not just consume you, in the moment, where people are together (membership, live events)

A deeper way to look at this is, what are you building that still works if a platform changes tomorrow?

Last week we restarted Lunch Club Bristol.

It reminded me that it’s not always about the content you create, but the contact you make.

I felt nervous bringing Lunch Club back, mainly because it didn’t work as anticipated in 2023. When something doesn’t land, it’s easy to treat the place as the problem, when often it’s the format that needed time to figure out.

Where we are today, there’s a format that works. One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned is, when you say you’re going to commit to a place, you stick to the place. Not just the town or city, also the venue.

People want somewhere that feels familiar, as it helps them feel settled. It means the format and the space, has to be repeatable, so it lowers the social friction. As each occasion progresses, attendees start making new people comfortable without you having to orchestrate it.

That’s what I want to demonstrate through Lunch Club. You can always walk into a room and be yourself, where you know there are talented people waiting for you. When it’s framed around a theme people recognise in their own lives, everyone leaves with something. If you put friendship at the centre, you can build everything else around it.

When you make that step to deliver an event in a new location, you can presume a lot. For me, I assumed people in Bristol already saw each other all the time through other events, they didn’t. My biggest mistake for the restart was thinking Lunch Club needed a ‘stamp of approval’ from other initiatives in the city, like I had to be allowed to exist.

If you have something you want to deliver, and you know there’s an audience for it, you have to put your best foot forward and let the work speak.

I want to build spaces where I can talk to people directly.

Here’s how I’m working around an approach of layers, so people can step into different YATM spaces without me being at the whim of someone else’s platform.

I call it the Permission Stack:

1) A doorway. Public visibility
LinkedIn posts, guest spots on podcasts, speaking. This is how new people find you.

2) A direct line. Owned contact
A newsletter rhythm or WhatsApp Groups (YATM has different groups for the events around the country). This is where you can speak without an intermediary, and where replies can happen.

3) A local room. Shared time
Live events around the UK. This is where trust speeds up because people experience you in full colour.

4) A home base. Continuity
For me, that’s YATM Club and Creator Day is the flagship occasion when people come together. This is where the relationship doesn’t reset to zero every time you show up online.

The further you move from the doorway, the more worthwhile it becomes for people. This is because you’re not competing with everything else on their screen.

Each layer reduces distance between you and someone else. It makes it easier for the right people to decide, “you’re my person.”

Each layer triggers something different emotionally:

– reassurance (I know where you’ll be)

– belonging (I’m not doing this alone)

– confidence (I can show up as me)

This is what building an audience looks like when you stop treating it like a numbers game and start treating it like relationship infrastructure.

When trust is scarce, people choose who they want to be with.

It’s not necessarily the loudest, but the person who is consistent, stands for something, shows up and has a track record.

That’s what building these spaces does. It lets people experience you over time, not just consume you in fragments. It turns your work into something people can return to, which is the foundation of being chosen.

One of my biggest mistakes has been delivering in silos, where people couldn’t see how one activity fits with another, or how the parts connect. I made it confusing for people to connect the dots.

This is what I mean when I say relevance doesn’t come from how well posts perform. It comes from relationships that repeat, one person at a time.

You just have to be clear on what people are actually buying today, such as certainty, safety, proximity, belonging and connection.

When content becomes effortless, the feed gets louder, not better.

You’ll never win it for long. Build somewhere people can return to.

Build one way to talk to people directly without asking permission from anyone else. Start a newsletter rhythm, or a small local group with a clear purpose, where you can commit to the place.

You just have to keep feeding it. This is the real alternative to fighting for attention, build somewhere people can go.

When you have a home base, where you’re not doing it alone, it becomes more rewarding for you and everyone else involved, continuity, support and people on your side.