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The day I quit being the productivity guy
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I spent years obsessing over niche selection. When I was a Forbes columnist, branding myself as “the productivity and leadership guy” seemed like a safe bet. I covered topics like time management, leadership, and getting sh*t done at work.
I wrote about these topics not because they were fun but because they felt like things to cover for my niche. Forbes killed me column after a few years. So I jacked in trying to become the productivity guy. Now, I look back at all this content and think, “booooring!” Screw niches. These days, I don’t worry about niche selection at all. When talking to a friend, you don’t announce, “I’m going to talk about all things productivity.” Instead:
Do this, and a niche will form around you and your interests. I call this principle writing from the bottom up. It’s more fun to create this way, and it’s more enjoyable for your readers. That’s one of the principles I teach in my course The Zettelkästen Method for Writers. It’s open today.
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Letters From the Desk of Bryan Collins
Do you want to grow a profitable content business? If so, join 25,000 readers. I share daily insights about personal brand building, writing online and growing a profitable business. It's for creators, coaches and business owners.
A reader said she’s started writing online. Her main challenge is seeing what content works without getting caught up in the numbers. At first glance, the numbers show creating shallow clickbait content is the way to go. On LinkedIn, round-ups of Harvard Business courses go viral every other week. On Insta, my feed is stuffed with jacked guys and gals running in the snow while wearing headphones and listening to dramatic music. On X, it’s threads starting with lines like, “You won’t believe...
I’m working on three new programs right now. I’ll only go with one, though. Which one interests you the most? Mastering Prompt Engineering: A private daily newsletter offering AI-powered content ideas and prompts. Scalable Content Accelerator: A capped program for content creators serious about scaling their income. The Daily Content Engine: A private Telegram community where I’ll share one actionable idea for a piece of content per day and give you feedback on what you create.
I use Trello for all sorts of content creation projects, including my YouTube channel. My Trello board has several key columns: To-Do, Next Up, Doing, Ready, and Done. I move my videos from left to right through these stages. The To-Do column contains 10–15 video ideas I want to create. I get these ideas from different places - sometimes, it’s from content I’ve published elsewhere, like an email I want to turn into a video. Other times, I see an interesting video and think I could create...