Am I messing up not having a community? [Audio Note]

I’m wrestling with a realization from Justin Moore’s 10K Brand Challenge - I don’t have a place for my audience to hang out and connect. I’m exploring options like Slack, Discord, and Circle, but feeling stuck on which platform makes sense for parent solopreneurs and my “chaos to clarity” framework development.

This is a raw, unresolved brainstorm about community building and why I think it’s essential for my content strategy.

This description was written by Claude.

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Streamlined Solopreneur is the podcast for solopreneurs who want to automate their business and take time off worry-free. Each week, Joe Casabona shares practical systems, tools, and strategies to help you reclaim your time and run your business without sacrificing your the rest of your life, or your health. 

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The problem is that if you're a solopreneur, your whole business can rely on you doing everything. As a result, you’re constantly worrying about it. But what if you had great systems in place to put parts of your business on autopoint, while you focus on the work that matters?

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I need a place for my audience to hang out. Justin Moore is doing his 10K Brand Challenge right now, and it's really been a masterclass. It's been a great inside look at how he builds community and pumps up creators to actually get out there and get sponsors. And I think, I haven't talked to him about this, but I think having his circle community is a big part of that.

I don't know that I need Circle per se. Maybe I can just use Slack, but I don't have a place for my audience to hang out. And I think that's really important. You know, I thought that for the podcast episodes, at least, since I'm making my podcast the linchpin of my content strategy, I thought that I could get away with having comments on each episode page.

But that's not a place to hang out. I'm basically giving them homework. Whereas if I have something like Slack or Discord, I'm inclined to think Slack. My audience is parent solopreneurs. So we're all probably between the ages of like 30 and 50. And Slack, I think to a lot of us feels more comfortable.

But I'm not giving them a place to post questions and discuss things. And I think I need that, especially if I want to do like a chaos to clarity challenge, which is I haven't talked much about this, but I've hired Charlotte Crowther to help me with my signature framework. And chaos to clarity is something I've been thinking about a lot.

Holly helped me, you know, streamlined equal spacious. And maybe this is what Charlotte will land on as well. I think that chaos to clarity is it feels more concrete than streamlined equals spacious. I also worried that streamlined has now been stolen by AI and people hear streamlined and think it's an AI term, which is really annoying.

It's like how people think that M- is a clear sign that AI wrote it, even though M- have been around forever and ever. Anyway, that's a sidebar. I've never been good at building community, because I've never taken the time to actually be in there and participate.

But I think I need something for people. I just keep going for people to hang out. And it probably won't be a place for people to hang out in the beginning. I think I get stuck on, like, what platform should I use? But I think I need something.

I'm less inclined to want to do Slack now that I'm thinking through it because, you know, they have that 90-day limit and Slack feels very corporate. But I also, I don't know if Circle is worth the $99 a month to me, at least right now. Like maybe I, I don't know.

I feel very stuck on this and maybe that's why I'm recording this voice note, this audio note, because I do feel very stuck, but I'm just, I'm not quite sure. This really is just kind of a brainstorm. It's a thought that occurred to me as I'm working through this document for Charlotte's Signature Framework and then everything that's going on with the 10K Brand Deal Challenge.

I don't have something to bring my listeners together. And I think I need that. I think I need that. So this is a very raw, unresolved note, but it's something I'm thinking about. And I'll probably be thinking about a lot more, especially because Streamlined Solopreneur is going to be the core of everything I do.

That's what I'm thinking. If you have thoughts, I'd love to hear them. You can go to streamlinedfeedback.com. And until next time, I hope you find some space in your week.